‘Artworks are a reflection of the world and culture in which they are produced.’
...ring different land, so he just put being a artist and explorer together to start trekking around Australia and New Zealand. The way he painted each artwork was amazing as you could see the artistic and cultural influences. If you look at “Mt William from Mt Dryden, Victoria”, you would firstly notice all the minor details that just light up this picture, making every single bit of the painting as important as another, but the focus being the other mountain on the other side showing its beautiful lighting. It is covering part of the valley, showing a reflection of the world in the way we see it. The bird that is flying above the valley, is a significant symbol because it is directing attention to the mountains in the foreground which are the main focus of this painting. Not only is it giving the mountains important value but also the whole painting as it is giving a spiritual feeling. He also has done this during a time that the weather would be a perfect condition and lighting would be perfect. Another artwork he has done called “North view of Daylesford, 1864”, shows the cultural background of the area. It shows a mine in use in the foreground, which is the “Garibaldi mine”. It also has another mine to the right of Garibaldi mine, called the “Concordia tunnel”. Owned by the “Stanbridge” family, the story of it is that it was a successful mine so they were paid 1/6th of the gold as royalty for mining on their land. The story and the two mines give it a representation of the world and culture, showing Australia during those times and what was happening around him. Again he did all the minor details to make sure everybody would admire it, showing that Australia was successful and beautiful. Later on contemporary art developed, it consisted of many different styles of ways to create an artwork. Some of the inventive styles are installations, performance, computer/interactive artworks, earth works or site specific works, artworks that are temporary and short-lived. They are known as “Contemporary Artists”. Both of those paintings showed the good sides of Australia and might have had some false painted interpretations on the artwork. It showed the individuality of the landscape, taming the new land for it to be supportable for people. They did it to get more people to come over to Australia so it would have a bigger colony and the bigger it got the more hands there were to help out. Thus it would create a community and start to build a better way of living for people to come. Contemporary Australian Landscape Painter - John Olsen Contemporary artwork was a different way to express yourself in a imaginative way, ranging from different styles and materials. John Olsen used creative mixed media with most of his artworks being from a aerial view of the land. He gained many influences from other artists, his artworks having shown his interest in literature and it focusing on Australian culture. They had more freedom to show how they expressed themselves in their paintings, not having to worry about what other colonials would say. A lot of contemporary artist showed the cultural side of Australia and it’s national identity, combining the landscape. There is more then the external look of the artwork but also the layers it has, giving people more things to think about and to deconstruct. Most of the artist try to convey an environmental issue in their paintings, not just to make it look beautiful and captivate people. ...