Clifford How: Wild State
-
Clifford HowWhere Time Stands Still – Myrtle Forest, 2022oil on linen208 x 214.5 cm; 210 x 216.5 cm (framed)Sold
-
Clifford HowQuiescent, 2022oil on linen168.5 x 184 cm; 170.5 x 186 cm (framed)Sold
-
Clifford HowContemplation – Liquid Sky, 2022oil on linen168.5 x 184 cm; 170.5 x 186 cm (framed)Sold
-
Clifford HowEndurance – Snow Melt, 2022oil on linen168.5 x 184 cm; 170.5 x 186 cm (framed)Sold
-
Clifford HowThe Quartz Monolith – Frenchmans Cap, 2022oil on linen168.5 x 184 cm; 170.5 x 186 cm (framed)Sold
-
Clifford HowSecretive, 2022oil on linen168.5 x 123 cm; 170.5 x 125 cm (framed)Sold
-
Clifford HowMaterialize – Sharlands Peak, 2022oil on linen153 x 138 cm; 155 x 140 cm (framed)Sold
-
Clifford HowDraped in Winter, 2022oil on linen137.5 x 153 cm; 139.5 x 155 cm (framed)Sold
-
Clifford HowLiquid Braid – Central Plateau, 2022oil on linen138 x 153 cm; 140 x 155 cm (framed)Sold
-
Clifford HowDistant Shimmer – The Reappearing Lakes, 2022oil on linen97 x 87 cm; 99 x 89 cm (framed)Sold
-
Clifford HowThe Summit in View – Pandani, 2022oil on linen87 x 97 cm; 89 x 99 cm (framed)Sold
-
Clifford HowThe Days Final Act, 2022oil on linen82 x 87 cm; 84 x 89 cm (framed)Sold
-
Clifford HowFinding Its Way – Myrtle Forest, 2022oil on linen87 x 87 cm; 89 x 89 cm (framed)Sold
-
Clifford HowHidden Secrets, 2022oil on board44 x 122 cm; 46 x 124 cm (framed)Sold
-
Clifford HowEthereal, 2022oil on linen66 x 61.5 cm; 68 x 63.5 cm (framed)Sold
-
Clifford HowEthereal II, 2022oil on linen61.5 x 66.5 cm; 63.5 x 68.5 cm (framed)Sold
-
Clifford HowQuiescent II, 2022oil on linen61.5 x 66.5 cm; 63.5 x 68.5 cm (framed)Sold
-
Clifford HowThe Little Creek Roared to Life After the Rain (Study), 2022oil on board49 x 30 cm; 51 x 32 cm (framed)Sold
-
Clifford HowThe Land Forms Gradually Emerged, 2022oil on linen46.5 x 87 cm; 48.5 x 89 cm (framed)Sold
-
Clifford HowBoundary – Waterfall Valley (Study), 2022oil on board34 x 93 cm; 36 x 95 cm (framed)Sold
-
Clifford HowTemperate Path – Myrtle Forest, 2022oil on linen56.5 x 51.5 cm; 58.5 x 53.5 cm (framed)Sold
-
Clifford HowAtmospheric Realm, 2022oil on board55 x 50 cm; 57 x 52 cm (framed)Sold
-
Clifford HowLast Kiss, 2022oil on board50 x 55 cm; 52 x 57 cm (framed)Sold
-
Clifford HowLight on the Walls, 2022oil on linen31 x 31 cm; 33 x 33 cm (framed)Sold
-
Clifford HowTransient Light in Flux, 2022oil on linen31 x 31 cm; 33 x 33 cm (framed)Sold
-
Clifford HowThe Days Final Act (Study), 2022oil on linen31 x 31 cm; 33 x 33 cm (framed)Sold
-
Clifford HowFade and Reveal – Ada Lagoon, 2022oil on board30 x 33 cm; 32 x 35 cm (framed)Sold
-
Clifford HowDraped in Winter (Study), 2022oil on board29.5 x 34.5 cm; 31.5 x 36.5 cm (framed)Sold
-
Clifford HowThe Sky Turned to Sapphire, 2022oil on board27 x 30 cm; 29 x 32 cm (framed)Sold
-
Clifford HowUncertainty, 2022oil on board27 x 30 cm; 29 x 32 cm (framed)Sold
-
Clifford HowAncient Stance, 2022oil on board30 x 32.5 cm; 32 x 34.5 cm (framed)Sold
Clifford How's newest series, 'Wild State', is a painterly ballad of Tasmania's ancient wilderness. As a fourth-generation Tasmanian, the variability - and volatility - of this island landscape is dear to the artist's heart, but this affiliation is not without a recognition of the colonial shadows that problematise the contemporary landscape and the history of landscape painting. How responds to this reality by re-wilding the landscape, erasing traces of humanity and restoring nature's sovereignty.
In 'Wild State', How takes a retrospective look at subjects and motifs, and more importantly, emotional connections he has experienced within specific landscapes in previous years. He explains, "Re-examining these subjects with a clearer vision technically, and a much deeper sense of place, has clarified the purpose behind my creativity". For years he has been engrossed in Tasmania's ancient and fragile temperate rainforests, a time capsule ecosystem unchanged for eons. How's atmospheric forest interiors evoke the fragility of this environment - a subject that, he admits, has been more challenging than the open, light-filled scenes he usually paints. Pigments are applied with a palette knife passionately and intuitively, allowing scenes to surge out of frame and swell from the linen, pushing the formal limits of the canvas. This movement is met, in moments, with stillness and quietude, as How captures the rich multi-dimensionality of this primordial place.
How's paintings consciously and consistently blur the line between the seen and the unseen. The landscape is captured in recognisable form for a tangible visual experience, but the artist tempers this vision with what he terms "organic abstraction" to create space for emotive thoughts. A self-taught painter, he manipulates scenes captured as en plein air studies with profound sensitivity, tracing not only the anatomy of place but its sentiment and spirit. To truly capture the atmosphere, light and colour of the moment, How immerses himself in the landscape - journeying into the Central Plateau and Highlands and the Tarkine Wilderness and rainforest, with a bush swag and backpack full of paints, brushes, sketchbooks and small boards. In works such as Where Time Stands Still - Myrtle Forest and Secretive, How's mastery of light, texture and tone hatch a fragrant, damp atmosphere that can be discernibly felt and smelt. Mossy greens and icy greys create a sensorial briskness as the cool purity of the Tasmanian air fills our lungs. The viewer, solitary, is engulfed by the flora, diminutive and humbled. The crystalline skin of a cool stream conceals ancient secrets that the forest will never divulge, while trunks and roots spill off the canvas, reaching for things out of sight. This alluring current of mystery is continued in the panoramic work Hidden Secrets, where the forest's wisdom is etched into the sprawling mats of omniscient moss, and the eternal trees that watch on with a cavernous quietude, making us conscious of our own breath, our own heartbeat.
There is a coolness to the works in 'Wild State' - not merely weather-wise (certainly these landscapes dance between Winter and Spring), but the way they carry themselves slowly, quietly, sensitively. How's generous swathes of paint are scraped back in the foreground of Distant Shimmer - The Reappearing Lakes, demarcating the foliage and hinting at a personal process of revelation. In the distance, spectral lakes linger like apparitions on the verge of vanishing, melting into the mountains and sky with soft ethereality.
Always devoid of people, or human indication, How's works are a meditation on our place in nature. They prompt us to contemplate, in the artist's words, how "we are very small in the scheme of things, and that these untamed places will exist beyond us. They demand to be cherished and protected."
Elli Walsh
Principle Writer, Artist Profile