Peter Lankas

OPENING/MEET THE ARTIST Saturday 20 July, 11am – 5pm ALL WELCOME

MEET THE ARTIST Saturday 10 August 11am – 2pm including Artist Talk at 1pm. Free event.

This is Peter’s second exhibition at Straitjacket. His first in 2022, Loungeroom escape. 

This exhibition is an exploration of random personal moments in the suburban/urban milieu, woven into narratives which begin with automatic drawings, existential grasps and calculated thefts from previous works. These combinations create problems to be solved via an intellectual and formal intent, including a search and discovery through painting’s alchemy. As the title suggests it is a journey moving forward and looking back, using all the artist’s experience of process from inception to the present, traversing the figurative and the abstract.

Simply put, this all comes down to the most common or frequent question a painter will ask, what to paint and how to paint it. For me, this happens with almost each piece.

I choose not to select a definitive concept to unite the work, letting each painting happen by a random selection of resonant elements that seem worthy of further development or exploration to form a narrative.

One thing that unites the work, is all paintings are preceded by iPad drawings which allows experimentation and wide parameters of quick trial and error problem solving. Often starting with random automatic scribbles, or drawings developed onto imported random studio test papers. Each painting is closely formulated from the drawings to conception, before another begins.

The work is made using studio crafted oil paint, made without any use of solvents, fillers or driers. Mediums, glazes and varnishes all organically made using ancient, simple methods, which allow broad complexity of painting.

ARTIST BIOGRAPHY
Peter Lankas has been teaching Fine Art for almost twenty years as a drawing and painting teacher, both in Tertiary and private capacity. He currently teaches drawing and painting at Newcastle Art School (TAFE) and has tutored and lectured painting at the University of Newcastle and TAFE FNQ. He has conducted a weekly life drawing class as well as a painting and drawing clases in a private capacity for 15 years and conducts experimental workshops in drawing and painting on an ongoing basis.

Peter has a strong studio practice as a painter, exhibiting regularly, with work held in private collections throughout Australia and over seas. He has a strong commitment to drawing which underlies his studio practice. He is represented by Straitjacket. To view his Artist page, click HERE.