FIRE AND WATER

The response for this came from a series of photographs I had taken of bush fires that had ravaged parts of the areas south of Sydney, at the time of the Canberra devastation. I had not known what to do with the image at the time. It had been percolating at the back of my mind until the recent tragic events in Victoria and New South Wales. I decided that the treatment had to be on a more monumental scale. I combined two of my canvases to form a large panoramic landscape format. I then began drawing in the scene using charcoal, as this was appropriate to the subject and achieved the graphic quality I wanted. This was then sprayed from above (similar to the airborne assaults on the fires) and a matt varnish applied. Cracking medium was added to selected parts of the burnt tree bark before another coat of charcoal wash was applied. A final coat of varnish was added to seal the canvases.