2nd Place
(Digital & Photography)
Athalie Taylor

“Abstract art uses a visual language of shape, form, colour and line to create a composition which may exist with a degree of independence from visual references in the world.” Rudolf Arnheim, Visual Thinking Athalie Taylor is a visual artist who lives in Launceston, Tasmania, Australia. Her work encompasses photography and digital artistry. Her initial training was in the art/textile area but more recently she has embraced photography leading to her passion, digital art. Athalie has had work in exhibitions in Northern Tasmania including her first solo exhibition in 2015 and in 2017 another solo exhibition this time at the Brunswick Street Gallery, Melbourne, Victoria. She was also selected for an online solo exhibition through Light, Space and Time in April 2017. Athalie ‘s work has been shown in the Living the Photo Artistic Life magazine, the AWAKEphotography magazine and the Artists Down Under – Australia and New Zealand magazine that she started but unfortunately had to pass over to anther editor when ill health intervened. Athalie has artworks in private collections across Australia.

Athalie Taylor’s exploration into abstract art began when she was very young, she always drew. As she grew up doodles appeared on every scrap of paper left unattended… envelopes, her school books and later college notes, magazines, the phone book, nothing was left unadorned. As an adult she was excited and motivated by art that included simple lines, (straight, curved, and those that meandered through the piece) geometric shapes, circles, any patterned works, especially textured pieces. She was drawn by strong colours, simple compositions, unusual ideas and aspects.

Many artists inspired her like Wassily Kandinsky, Piet Mondrian, Hans Hoffman and others, they still do today. She uses her camera in unexpected non-conventional ways. She is constantly forcing it to do what she wants, to get the starting point she needs for an artwork. The subject can be out of focus or taken pin sharp, it all depends on what she is trying to achieve at the time. Often there are different versions of the same subject which are later melded together to make the piece. Ideas develop and grow within the creation of the piece, she often gets lost in the process and when she’s done wonders how she finally reached that point. Some effects are achieved in the camera while others are developed and created in post processing.

On the more graphic side of her art she explores shapes; circles, lines, angles, triangles, all kinds of forms. She often distorts and manipulates sections or all of a piece. Often the graphic creations are added to the photographic idea, other times they stand alone. She is fascinated by shadows, sometimes her own, and reflections, and they regularly feature in her work. She draws, photographs, designs, creates, just for the love of it; the pure joy it gives her every day. The submitted works represents her exploration of all things abstract, in her mind and from her imagination.

To see more of Athalie’s work, please visit her website.

2nd Place
(3 Dimensional)
Julie Light

In my work I explore tensions and contrasts that fascinate me: how the organic and the mechanistic coexist, how visible and translucent surfaces hide or reveal what is inside. Glass is a perfect medium for this; forms can be viewed from inside as well as out with surfaces that reflect light, transmit it or stop it dead. I make primarily sculptural objects, believing strongly that people engage with three dimension objects in a totally different way to two dimensional images.

My work is highly influenced by an ongoing curiosity about scientific histories and developments, particularly in relation to how people visualise health and disease and how that influences a sense of embodiment and identity. These pieces, however, were a response to the forms and textures we stumble on in the world around us. The Wrapped Form is one of a series drawing on the visual qualities of crumpled discarded plastics. The Snow Wheels were inspired by the qualities of trodden snow. And New Flow references water flow through grilles, grids and lattices both in its decoration and in its photographic presentation.

To see more of Julie’s work, please visit her website.

3rd Place
(Digital & Photography)
Jo Scheder

An anthropologist by profession, Jo Scheder is a self-taught artist and photographer. Her recent exhibition includes the Los Angeles Center for Digital Art (LACDA); Blank Wall Gallery, Athens, Greece; the Chania International Photography Festival, Crete; and group exhibits in Chicago, Los Angeles, and Maine.

To learn more about Jo’s work, please email her directly.

3rd Place
(3-Dimensional)
Cherie Lee

Cherie’s art both literally and figuratively stresses the boundaries of ordinary matter and substance, questioning, “how far?” before strength must succumb to its weakness. Her medium, itself, has represented strength and weakness, birth and rebirth, in virtually every civilization throughout history, and organically serves as metaphor for both the physical and metaphysical human conditions. Having become permanently disabled as a young adult, her work and material reflects the multitudinous dichotomy of ‘ability’ and ‘disability’, and is a celebration and rebuke of both. “My art takes the form of life, asking life, ‘how strong are we of mind body or spirit?’ It silently poses the same question our universe shouts every day: ”How far, before you break?” Through use of subtractive sculpture, she takes divinely developed organisms and grinds away at them. Scratching at surfaces, shining lights and shaving shadows, seeking out the cracks and holes, ever mindful of hidden flaws. She exposes the external stressors to highlight our internal ones. Her work provokes contemplative conversations of the tensions and compressions that bridge and anchor us all. Her current direction is propelled by rather rigorous and imminent personal struggles at hand. It is the culmination of the often overwhelming deluge of life, existence and survival: Weakening Strength. Redemption leading to evolution. Emerging steadfast and triumphant, Uncracked.

To see more of Cherie’s work, please visit her website.