Tribute to Maths and the Opposable Thumb - V = 1/3A0h, The Invention of Zero and E=MC2 - Government House Art Show 2011

Ants Attack their Genes in the Rainbow Serpent's DNA - Exhibited Belco Bizzaire, Canberra 2010

Black Mountain Ram - Exhibited Straithnairn Woolshed, Canberra 2010

Becoming Australian - Exhibited Quenbeyan Regional Art Show, Canberra 2010

Conception of Genesis - Exhibited as Part of Meeting Place, Canberra 2010

Genesis of i - Exhibited Quenbeyan Regional Art Show, Canberra 2010

Threads of Government; legos, ethos, pathos - Exhibited at the ACT Legislative Assembly, 20th anniversay of self-government exhibition, Canberra 2009

The Black Swan

Canberra Institute of Technology - 2009

Strathnairn Arts Association - 2009

I do a lot of painting using oils and acrylic on canvas. Although I am proud of what I create, no surface or medium provides me with as much gratification as ink on rock. One of the attractions is that the surface is not a blank canvas. Each piece of rock tells a story of its creation in the flow of its sediment and the stress lines revealed by splitting it. It is a story that must be worked with during the painting or arrangement. In turn, a human chapter is added to the rock's history. So much of modern life is disconnected from the landscape that I appreciate every small opportunity to reconnect with it.

Working with the landscape is particularly gratifying when exploring concepts relation to identity and connection to place. My favourite rock is slate from Black Mountain, a mountain in the centre of Canberra. I grew up on its foothills and each time I returned to Canberra after wandering around Asia, Africa or America, walking on it anchored me once more.

As well as allowing me to feel a connection to a specific place, I feel rock also connects me to humanity. As I paint on and on, I feel I am taken back to genesis of human culture. I am taken back a time when art was pure; a time when art is not produced for fame or fortune. It is a time when paintings can't be replicated 1,000 times and sold as signed prints, and where artists were not pressured to keep to one style for marketing purposes. It is a time before surrealist art in the style of Margritte or Dali could be created on Photoshop by someone with a few hours training and a time before a coloured triangle was seen as a statement of rebellion.

While I seek a time before categories, I do not disconnect myself from the humanity that created me. I am what I am due to those European, Asian, African, Australian artists that went before, the scientists that produced the theories, the poets that captured emotion and the teachers that taught the old and new ways. I do not paint on the rock to simply connect to the voice of the earth, I also paint to reflect upon how far humanity has come since the first artists put up a hand and spat a silhouette 30,000 or more years ago. I am in awe of how far humanity has come and what we have been able to achieve. As I engage with the rock, humanity speaks to me and I speak of it. Sometimes it is easy to focus on a little problem in the social world and feel that humanity is messed up, but when the big picture is in view, it becomes so much easier to appreciate just how amazing humanity is.