Address: Sidespace Gallery

A pictorial journey through Hobart en plein air by Peter Rudd. 

“My recent cityscapes depict the streets, buildings, parks and docks of Hobart. I like to paint outdoors because I am drawn to the colour of light at different times of day, and in different weather, and I want to translate my experience of looking at it into paint. 

Painting these pictures has been my way of getting to know Hobart. I have chosen subjects which produce an emotional response in me, and which I feel express the charm of the city. I have especially enjoyed observing the layering of old and new architecture which can be seen in Hobart wherever one goes.”
– Peter Rudd

Vale is a collection of paintings by Lorna Quinn, created after an experience with a mountain plain in the Central Highlands in 2020.

“As a tourist looking in from a designated viewing platform, I found pleasure in imagining living on the slopes of the mountain as a bat or a worm or as a gust of wind. At the same time, I felt a sense of pain at the remoteness of this vision of dwelling – an absolute separateness from it. These two feelings, of inhabiting, and of outsideness, tangled together in a sort of ache, a longing, that I decided to represent in paint. Using a combination of holiday snaps, memory, and invention back at home, I repetitively formed and reformed the hills that I could remember in careful experiments with colour, texture and shade.  

Returning to the viewing platform two years later, I found that my impression of the place had shifted. The idea of the mountain scene had grown so complete in its absence that the real thing felt pale and diminished, the paintings more concrete.”
– Lorna Quinn

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Lorna Quinn

Lorna Quinn is a Melbourne based artist, creating small-scale portraits of vegetation, rock, earth and sky. Her practice considers the triangular relationship between landscape, personal experience and painting.

Opening Event
Friday 17 February 2023
5:00pm – 7:00pm

Enter a gallery space transformed – by designers, using seaweed-derived products – into a ‘speculative vision of a future home’, where a regenerative relationship between humanity and earth (and seaweed) has blossomed.

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Pneu is part of the International Seaweed Symposium (ISS) and MONA FOMA 2023

Opening Event
Friday 3 February 2023
6:00pm – 8:00pm

Layers of monochrome became earth, sky, abstracted fields, wheat and grass twisted, flattened and forced – a changed landscape. From Nina Keri‘s psyche comes images of Ukraine as the breadbasket. Food, sustenance, life – threatened again by war. Borderland consists of eight works painted in heartfelt response to Ukraine.

“For several years the theme of my artwork has been my maternal family history – of life in Ukraine before and during the Second World War.  Specifically, the stories from my Russian Grandma.  I have shaped her stories into forms that are carriers of a deep family narrative of survival and continuation despite the destruction of war.  Part of me has always experienced Ukraine through my Grandma’s stories.  It is an almost fairy tale place in my psyche.  In my mind’s eye I see the farm, the many creatures that shared the life of the family, horses, cattle, pigeons, rabbits, a pet fox and a pet wolf, the great expanse of Steppe. green and verdant, where Grandma would ride.  But as with all fairy tales, there is darkness and evil.  I also see the cattle train taking my grandmother away, and her beloved uncle running after it.  It’s a real place, but I have never been there.  Yet in my DNA lies the deep rich soil, maybe alongside bits of broken china, rusty nails and animal bones.  To see this world of my imagination down the barrel of a soldier’s gun, uploaded to tiktok, is almost indescribable for me. 

On the 24th of February 2022, to my shock and disbelief, Russia invade Ukraine.  Four days into the war I started painting without concept, in a cathartic state, to release my mental and emotional anguish.  Layers of monochrome became earth and sky, abstracted fields, wheat and grass that’s twisted, flattened and forced – a changed landscape.  From deep in my psyche comes images of Ukraine as the breadbasket.  Food, sustenance, life – all this is threatened again by war.  I allowed myself free rein in the creative process.  If an image came to mind, I would honour it.  If there were suggestions in the beginning of a work, I would follow them.  I have named this exhibition Borderland.  It consists of eight works painted in heartfelt response to Ukraine.”
– Nina Keri

The annual Hunter Island Press (HIP) Mini Print Exhibition and Sale showcases the different printmaking techniques and variety of subjects undertaken by its members. 

The fine art prints are all a uniform paper size of 21cm x 21cm and are affordably priced at $40 each.

The work is pegged around the room and customers are encouraged to help themselves to the print they would like to purchase in an untraditional gallery style way. As a print is sold, it is replaced with another by the same printmaker. This may not necessarily be the same subject or technique as participants are unrestricted for this Exhibition. Sales are made on a first come, first serve basis.

Opening Event
Friday 25 November 2022
6:00pm – 8:00pm

An exhibition of new landscape paintings in oil, by Stephen Mallick.

Opening Event
Friday 11 November 2022
6:00pm – 8:00pm

An exhibition of small sculptural works in wood by Taiwanese/Tasmanian artist Chi Ling Tabart.

We are all sentient beings. We talk about our feelings and express those complex emotions in language and in art. There are various eddies in our life we deal constantly with. Some are bigger and some are smaller caused by psychological and environmental stressors.

Eddies are rolling us and pushing us around and creating a state of unhappiness. Sometimes we get stuck, or capsized by the turbulence, but other times we learn to cope and recover emotionally with days, months or years.

Opening Event
Friday 14 October 2022
6:00pm – 8:00pm

A study of identity through portraiture and still life, by Zoe Lovell.

“Portraits give us a glimpse into who a sitter is through their physical appearance. We are able to understand aspects of who they are through their facial expressions, body language and personal style. However, there’s always more to someone than what’s presented on the surface.

This body of work was born out of a frustration of being overlooked based on my outward appearance and the way I present myself. We each have our own unique experience with this sense of dismissal, regardless of how we appear on the outside and it saddens me to know that through some eyes, we’re only worth as much as our looks. 

I have created a series of portraits of myself and my friends, showcasing not only the way we look, but aspects of our lives that shape our identities, whether that’s through our lived in spaces or objects of importance to us. My aim during this process has been to capture aspects of ourselves that we value most and want to be recognised for. We each have our own set of ambitions, skills and personality traits that define who we are and eclipse the significance of our outward appearances. 

Whilst I have created portraits, which typically only give us a sense of personality through expression, body language and looks, these paintings aim to be a quiet celebration of individuality through the everyday and act as windows into the lives and identities of the subjects.”
– Zoe Lovell

An exhibition by Landscape Photographer Samuel Allen

“My homeland of Tasmania is a natural setting for landscape photography. The untouched temperate rain-forests, world heritage areas and coastal scenery is simply breathtaking. A plethora of famous walking tracks, well-formed and sometimes not well known within the island, lead to locations perfect for capturing images that I try to showcase with my photography.”
– Samuel Allen

From marine algae to twisted trees, this exhibition by Anna Brooks explores a fascinating variety of plant forms.

An exhibition of works on paper, including printmaking, photography, drawing and collage. Intimate portraits show each plant, or plant part, as something precious and intriguing. The works emphasise form and pattern and the diversity of shapes and designs found in nature. They celebrate the mysterious nature of plants, and draw the viewer into the inner reaches of other organisms which may sometimes seem alien and sometimes familiar.

Anna Brooks has a great love of plants. This began when she was a child roaming around in bushland on the family farm, continued through a degree in Botany, and years of bushwalking in many wonderful places. Brooks completed her Honours in Fine Arts in 2021.  Almost all of her art is about the natural world.