The final exhibition for FireWorks 2019 Matches presents a solo show of 23 recent oil paintings titled From the Hill by Mt Glorious artist Yvonne Mills-Stanley downstairs at the gallery. Upstairs Woven, a curated small-group exhibition of 16 artworks across varying media showcases Indigenous and non-Indigenous artists including: Dorothy Napangardi, Regina Wilson, Helen Tyalmuty McCarthy, Paul Bong, Evelyn McGreen, Miles Allen and fibre artists from Maningrida Arts & Culture.

From the Hill represents Mills-Stanley’s 7th solo exhibition over the past 15 years at FireWorks gallery. This title reveals something of the artists daily outlook, looking down at Brisbane from the mountain, as seen in the work of the same title (FW19149). This impressive collection of 23 delicate oil paintings, depicting real and imagined landscapes, each present ‘grass’ as an ongoing thematic texture. Mills-Stanley comments: “Most of my week is spent in close proximity to rural grasses which, in most cases is allowed to roam free.  In areas where the sky appears close to the earth, I find the sky and grass together become a focus of many of the works.  These intimate landscapes become all enveloping of the canvas.  From the viewer’s perspective these images are a reminder of memories that are evoked of similar places and hills and grasses walked through, perhaps years ago.”

Never simply just a grassy landscape, each painting by Mills-Stanley creates new contexts and illuminations within her dramatic compositions, such as Haywire II (FW19145). Rhythmic lines of grass have the capacity to transport the viewer even  to remote parts of Australia as is seen in A quiet place (FW19153) with references from a trip to Tasmania. FireWorks Gallery Director Michael Eather says: “These are superbly crafted oil paintings, loaded with a strong metaphor for the spirit and movement of grass, seemingly imbued with the very fragrance of the Australian landscape. They simply vibrate and shimmer with their rhythmic and deliberate strokes of paint.”

The works in Woven allude more-so to the intertwining of handmade structures and forms. Included are fibre artworks, by Lorna Jin-gubarrangunyja, Agnes Djunguwana and Agnes Walapirr which comprise of naturally dyed pandanus mats and baskets from Arnhem Land. Woven also touches on ‘weaving’ as a subject in itself, or as an image explored within paintings such as in Regina Wilson’s Durrmu (FW19070), and in the printmaking mediums of Evelyn McGreen from Hopevale FNQ.  In contrast, the geometric shapes and rhythms seen in Miles Allen's Weaving series (FW16309) directly reference and utilise recycled packing materials interlacing history and texture with pattern and symmetry. A bold and alluring painting by Helen Tyalmuty Macarthy (FW19071) similarly demonstrates a linear pattern of connection seemingly woven into her cultural identity.

These two exhibitions further looks to blur the artistic boundaries through both contrasts and connectivity of universal themes. The balance of both natural and the man-made form provides a distinctive rural Australian flavour.

Artwork prices range from:  $1200 – 25,000