Terpentine Sneezes — Spalding at Stanley Street Gallery, Exhibition Text

Spalding, Guthega, 2015, oil on linen (Image courtesy of Stanley Street Gallery)

Spalding’s new exhibition Gesundheit: Gum turpentine makes me sneeze has opened at Stanley Street Gallery in Darlinghurst, and will run until 9 April. I had the pleasure of exploring these vast canvases by writing the exhibition text for the show. 

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Spalding’s paintings immerse viewers in the windswept and weather-beaten landscape of the Snowy Mountains, as dense mist and snow give way to twisted gums and scrub.

Fascinated with capturing Australia’s mountain landscape as he experiences it, Spalding feels the landscape through his paintings. Up on the worn peaks of our ancient mountain ranges, he observes the intense colours of high altitudes through the sharp, clear light of the mountain air.

After the devastating fires that burnt through the Kosciuszko region in 2003, Spalding began collecting the charcoal remnants of trees and using these to draw the burnt scenes before him.