Chantal is an Australian artist who grew up in many outback and small country towns throughout Australia in an era where outdoor play was the mode of life. She now calls the Gippsland region with its beautiful natural landscapes home. Her works are of a semi abstract nature where she uses loose and gestural brushstrokes to evoke a feeling of the bush and landscape that she calls home. Like our own unique signature these brush marks are the elements in her art that makes it unique. Chantal likes to use loose expressive marks to describe the landscape and earth that we live on.

Chantal is interested in how we live on the earth in a way that reduces our impact and cares about this in both her work practices and the way she lives. Chantal loves using colour and texture in her work to build up layers as she tells the story of the Australian landscape. Chantal often uses natural ochres and pigments that are native to the places that hold deep meaning for her. Her paintings tell a beautiful story of the Australian landscape as works of poetry in paint.

Chantal’s use of ground earth pigments collected from the region locally connect her work in a physical way as they are worked into the paintings. These works are a collection of landscapes that hold deep meaning for her as she celebrates the collaboration of nature and art making. By using elements of the earth in her artwork it connects the art in a physical and emotional way to the place that it is from. Chantal believes we are of nature and as such should work to live in harmony with it. In it and of it rather than trying to control it. By using loose gestural marks she hopes to convey this sense of letting go of control and allowing ourselves to be within the cycles and imperfect systems of nature.

Read more about Chantal here.

"The early morning air is crisp and cool. We see the breath leave our bodies as the warmth of our breath connects with the cold that hangs in the air. Winter fogs linger in the hills and valleys. Remnants of trees affected by past years fires leave echoes of themselves while the remaining gums are tinged with hints of purple and reds. I gather charcoal from the ground to be worked into later works. Elements of the environment to be cycled and reused. Living on in another form."

Chantal de Kock, 2024