Narrabri NSW artist Deb Michell-Smith is artist whose work delves into the landscapes and resilient spirit of regional Australia. Through her landscape paintings, Deb captures the strength and endurance of individuals and environments in remote settings. Her work invites viewers to reflect on the beauty and hardships of the Australian outback.

In The Pattern of Birds, Michell-Smith captures the quiet elegance and rhythmic patterns of birds within the vast landscapes of regional Australia.
“This series captures the essence of regional Australia, intertwining the landscapes and birdlife that define its vast, untamed beauty. Birds, as symbols of freedom, move effortlessly through these environments, embodying the deep connection between land and life. Through expressive brushwork and considered colour palettes, I seek to evoke the sense of space, movement, and harmony that exists between these creatures and the landscapes they call home. Each piece is an invitation to pause and appreciate the resilience and quiet poetry of the Australian bush.” 

“Sky bright & colourless with promise of day, contests the cool air and dark shadows. Houses, partially hidden, stand tall—quietly watchful as boats, tension broken, wiggle with windows winking. Trees, their branches dipping, anticipate sun’s first tickle. And in waters green all this is seen, a moment, reflected, remembered, and held with in the Phthalo”.

Using a painting knife and oil, Miranda Joy Summers captures the essence of water and land, the interplay between soluble and solid matter. Her knife strokes are deliberate and expressive, shaping the scene through tone and form. She emphasises the dynamic interplay between negative and positive space, creating a unique dialogue between the foreground and the perceived distance, effectively reducing spatial separation. This technique challenges conventional perceptions of landscape painting, inviting viewers to engage with both the foreground and distance in a similarly subjective way.

In ‘Tracing Stillness’, Georgie Kite presents a contemplative body of work that explores the landscape not as a static subject but as something experienced through quiet, sustained attention. Since relocating to Yuin Country in 2016, Kite has immersed herself in the rhythms of the coastal environment. This lived engagement informs her distinctive visual language, shaped not by dramatic vistas but by the slow unfolding of detail.

Drawing on a background in photomedia and literature, Kite’s practice is grounded in observation and reflection. Her paintings develop gradually, layering colour, form, and texture to create surfaces where motifs such as vessels, headlands, and native flora seem to emerge and recede. These works are less representations of place than meditations on how place is perceived — how time, weather, light, and mood shift the way we see and understand the world around us.

In this context, “stillness” becomes a mode of heightened awareness

In her latest series I carry you with me, Melbourne-based artist Clare Dubina continues her quiet, confident exploration of the female form—its gestures, silhouettes, and the emotional weight carried in its negative spaces. Known for her warm, earthy palette and a practice that spans painting and ceramics, Clare’s work evokes a sense of organic simplicity, where every curve and texture feels both intentional and intuitive. 

Born in 1977 to a British mother and Sri Lankan father, Clare graduated with a Bachelor of Fine Arts from The University of the Arts in 2001. However, it wasn’t until 2020 that she returned to her sketchbooks—originally filled during her university years, when her senior thesis focused on the female form—and began to shape the foundations of her current art practice. In the years between, Clare carved a varied creative path, working across fashion photography and retail design around the world. These formative experiences are still present in her work today, seen in the compositional awareness, the attention to surface, and the way her pieces seem to belong in both the home and the gallery space.

Clare’s paintings are loosely planned—sketched in advance with a strong sense of colour palette and form. “If I overthink as I’m drawing, I lose the organic markings and shapes my hands naturally want to create,” she explains. The result is a conversation between control and intuition, between stillness and movement.

Despite her quiet humility, Clare’s work has captured wide attention. Her previous series have sold out before reaching gallery walls, and her collaborations with Australian design names such as Viktoria & Woods and En Gold have only broadened her audience. Still, she remains grounded in the quiet rituals of making. Her studio—a small, light-filled space in a Brunswick warehouse—is both practical and personal. “It’s most likely going to stay in the practical state of white walls and bare concrete floors,” she says.

Clare’s inspirations range from the photographic simplicity of Edward Weston and Bill Brandt to the layered abstraction of Serge Poliakoff, and she’s equally drawn to the unexpected: a shadow across a wall, the way skin folds echo petals, or the tactile pleasure of running her fingers over a plant leaf. A trained printmaker, she brings a deep respect for surface and material to every medium she touches.

In every brushstroke, curve, and line, Clare Dubina offers a space for that kind of quiet discovery—a body of work that, much like the artist herself, invites you to look again, and feel something more.

We are proud to announce ‘Light Colour Landscape’, our next banner exhibition at Michael Reid Southern Highlands. This significant presentation brings together eleven of Australia’s foremost contemporary artists, each deeply engaged with the Australian landscape. Their work explores its vastness, its changing light, and its rich textures, offering a diverse array of perspectives on this ever-evolving environment.

At the heart of the exhibition is a Mun-dirra (fish fence) by Jennifer Prudence, a Burarra fibre artist from Maningrida in Arnhem Land. Prudence’s work, created using pandanus she harvests and dyes with natural pigments drawn from her ancestral Country, is a powerful expression of connection to both land and culture. Her intricate weavings not only reflect the land’s rhythms and spiritual significance but also embody the knowledge and traditions passed down through generations. Prudence’s piece anchors the exhibition, grounding it in the profound, living relationship between people and place.

‘Light Colour Landscape’ unites both familiar and first-time voices to our audience, each contributing a unique and essential perspective. Through a range of mediums — from painting to fibre, ink to etching, and clay to mixed media — these artists engage in a collective dialogue with the land, its light, its memory, and the shifting ways in which we experience it.

It is our enormous pleasure to welcome Melbourne-based still life painter Susan Morris to our Project Space at Michael Reid Southern Highlands this month, with her collection of new work titled A Walk in the Park.

On walks with her dog Milou in her home-town of Melbourne, also known as ‘the city of gardens’, Susan’s painter’s eye observes and picks out plants in her local environment to be captured in oils back in her studio.  The ever ubiquitous dried gum leaves depicted in the painting Fall, is a celebration of one of nature’s gifts at the end of its life cycle.  A small branch that would usually be trodden on or swept aside, it’s beauty now brought back to life through gentle and fine brush strokes.  The inky dark background highlighting its fragility and uniqueness as it dances and falls in the light.

“Still life is often autobiographical in nature, as are my paintings. They reflect where I’ve been and where I live. The containers also have a story to tell, whether it is in the immediacy of a glass jar,  an heirloom vase from a country far away or a clay vessel from a local potter. Holding our precious and unique indigenous flora, that relationship speaks of home, history and country.” says Susan.

Susan has been a finalist in numerous awards including the Waterhouse Natural Science and Art Prize, the Mosman Art prize, the Lethbridge 20000, the Waverley Art Prize, Omnia Art Prize, the Linden Postcard Prize and the York Botanic Prize as well as a solo exhibition at the Victorian Artists Society in 2021.

For Sydney-based painter Mary Stack, the domestic realm becomes a space for formal experimentation and quiet reflection. In Unfolded Linen on Linen II, she continues her investigation into the visual potential of the everyday—handkerchiefs, tea towels, the folds and creases of cloth. “Everyday items like handkerchiefs and tea towels felt like a familiar starting point,” she says. “By isolating these objects from their usual surroundings, my aim is to keep the interpretation open.” Though the subject matter may appear humble, Stack’s intellectual foundations are deeply rooted in art history.

A joint recipient of the 2023 Brandon Trakman Prize for Art History and Theory, she sees her practice as part of a broader, ongoing conversation. “While artists strive for original work, we cannot ignore that everything we make is part of a larger conversation.” Her influences are broad, ranging from the rigorous abstraction of Albers and Agnes Martin to the hushed, luminous order of Vermeer and de Hooch. “There’s something about the way they used light and shadow—it’s not just about realism. It’s about presence, and creating space for reflection.”

The Maningrida Arts Community in north-west Arnhem Land produces a rich variety of fibre objects, both utilitarian and artistic. These include mats, baskets, bags, wall hangings, ceremonial regalia, and sculptural fish traps.

The primary thread for these weavings is the pandanus leaf, which is dyed using natural materials like the bloodroot. The weaving process is laborious, but the women who practice it take pride in their craft and its transmission to younger generations.

Each weaver’s unique style is reflected in her work. The colours of the weavings—reds, yellows, browns, black, and green—echo the changing seasons and the availability of different dye-yielding plants.

Maningrida Arts and Culture, the coordinating art centre for the Mun-dirra project at the NGV Triennial, is a leading Indigenous arts centre representing renowned artists like John Mawurndjul. Notably, the Mun-dirra project resulted in the creation of Australia’s largest woven sculpture.

Images on Country: Richard Mockler for ‘Making Mun-dirra’ – with Anna Freeland, ABC Arts, February 12 2024

Information Sourced: Elizabeth Fortescue, ‘Vast fish fence takes centre stage at Melbourne’s NGV Triennial’, The Art Newspaper, December 4 2023

In Lookaftering, a group exhibition featuring Anthea Stead, Elena Larkin, and Miranda Hampson, the act of care takes on layered meanings. Each artist draws on their intimate connections to place, memory, and culture to explore the creative and ecological imperatives of ‘looking after’. As Annie Dillard once wrote, “There is no shortage of good days. It is good lives that are hard to come by.” This exhibition presents three artists who, through their work, strive to create not only good art but lives imbued with meaning, care, and attention to the natural world.

Anthea Stead’s paintings offer a meditation on the Illawarra Escarpment and its surrounding coastal landscapes. Though rooted in the region’s storms, cliffs, and seas, her works are composites—imagined scenes built from memory, photographs, and imagination. This merging of the familiar and the invented mirrors the ecological balance she observes: the delicate interplay between preservation and vulnerability. Stead’s paintings, with their moments of calm before the storm, evoke the fragility of the world we inhabit, compelling us to care for it as she does.

Elena Larkin’s layered impressions of the Australian bush bring an immersive and dynamic perspective to the theme of care. Working in gouache, she captures the ephemeral rhythms of light and shadow in the forest, painting the sensory experiences of being surrounded by nature. Her dappled, pointillistic markings reflect the vitality of the natural world, shaped by her childhood on Bundjalung Land. Larkin’s works suggest that to look after the land is to embrace its beauty in all its chaos and impermanence, a reminder of our deep, reciprocal relationship with the environments we inhabit.

For Miranda Hampson, an Anaiwan artist, looking after is an act of cultural and personal reclamation. Her work, such as Kati Thanda, honours Indigenous connections to Country, drawing on her heritage and her background in cultural heritage management. Hampson’s paintings are rooted in the shared experiences of kin, Country, and place. Her art extends the idea of care beyond the ecological, suggesting it as a means to heal and strengthen the bonds between people, land, and culture.

Lookaftering offers a poignant reflection on the many ways we care—through art, through attention, and through action. As Dillard suggests, good lives are hard to come by, but in the work of Stead, Larkin, and Hampson, we see a dedication to creating lives of care and connection.