Kathryn Brimblecombe-Fox
Painter (Brisbane, QLD)

Kathryn likes to play with perspective by taking the viewer to a variety of viewpoints. She imagines being outside, inside, on top of, under and beside her subject. When she was a child she dreamt she could fly. She ‘knew’ what her parent’s farm looked like from above despite never having flown over it in a plane. She grew up outside Dalby in South Western Queensland, Australia. Looking east the Bunya Mountain Ranges cut a majestic silhouette against an immense sky. In the West the unbroken horizon was dead flat. She lived on a treeless plain. Vastness was very close.

Kathryn cannot remember a time when she did not paint. Her mother and grand mother painted, wrote poetry, short stories and histories. She grew up with a love of cultural and artistic pursuits.

After completing a B.A with a double major in Art History from the University of Queensland in 1980, Kathryn worked at the National Gallery of Australia. However, marriage took her to Goondiwindi where she spent eighteen years before moving to Brisbane in 2000. Whilst living in Goondiwindi Kathryn exhibited in Brisbane and generally in South East Queensland. 

Upon arriving back in Brisbane she was invited to undertake a PhD in Art History at the University of Queensland. However, after successfully completing the bridging course for entry into the PhD program Kathryn decided her real love was painting rather than study. She returned to her painting with gusto.

Kathryn has exhibited extensively in South East Queensland and in recent years has had wonderful opportunities to exhibit overseas. These include solo exhibition in London 2002, Dubai 2004, Abu Dhabi 2005 and group shows in New York 2004,Dubai 2006 and Seoul 2007.

Contact Kathryn Brimblecombe-Fox
Visit Kathryn Brimblecombe-Fox website

SELECTED SOLO EXHIBITIONS
2007 Prayers For The Planet: We are all the same. Doggett Street Gallery, Brisbane
2006 Pulse Doggett Street Gallery, Brisbane
2006 Queensland Performing Arts [QPAC] Directorate, Brisbane [by invitation]
2005 Abu Dhabi Cultural Foundation, UAE
2004 Green Art Gallery, Dubai, UAE
2003 Cut Lines Mackay Artspace, Mackay
2003 Here Comes the Bride Soapbox Gallery, Brisbane.
2003 Falling And Rising Artours Gallery, Bulimba.
2002 Distance Gallery 27, Cork St, London. 
2002 Cut Lines Soapbox Gallery, Brisbane. 
2000 Look and See [Hopefully] SOApBOx Gallery, Brisbane.
1996 Knitting Time Whitebox Gallery, Brisbane.
1993 McWhirter's Artspace, Brisbane.
1992 Choices, Impact Art Gallery, Maleny.
1992 One Step At A Time, Loading Bay, MOCA, Brisbane.
1989 Young Artists Gallery, MOCA, Brisbane.                

SELECTED GROUP EXHIBITIONS
2008 Wonderland KILN Gallery, Brisbane [March/April]
2007 Gallery L, Seoul, Korea
2006 30 Square,Doggett Street Gallery, Brisbane
2006 A Gift Of Colour Mondo Arte Gallery, Dubai, United Arab Emirates
2006 Robyn Bauer Gallery, Brisbane
2005 Robyn Bauer Gallery, Brisbane
2005 All My Friends Are Getting Married, Pine Rivers Regional Gallery
2004 The Australiana and New Zealand Fine Art Exhibition  Agora Gallery, New York, USA
2003 Straticulation Jan 14-31 Soapbox Gallery, Brisbane.
2002 Aesthetics Feb 15-March 5 Soapbox Gallery, Brisbane.
1999 Living Here Now: Art and Politics, for Australian Perspecta, Artspace, Sydney.
1999 Future Text, SOApBOX Gallery, Brisbane.
1999 Cargo, SOApBOx Gallery, Brisbane.
1997 Bildermacht, SOApBOx Gallery, Brisbane
1995 Response with Jump Up Arts, Metro Art Gallery, Brisbane.
1995 Common Ground, Bartleme Gallery, Brisbane.
1994 Visions For Artemis, Impact Gallery, Maleny.
1994 An Unbroken Existence, Jump Up Arts installation, Institute of Modern Art, Brisbane.
1994 An Unbroken Existence, Jump Up Arts installation, Goondiwindi.
1991 A Woman's Journey, McWhirter's Artspace, Brisbane.
1985 Launching of book Downs Artists: A Changing Landscape by N. Durack and P. King

COLLECTIONS
Abu Dhabi Cultural Foundation, Ipswich City Art Collection, Dalby Regional Gallery Collection, Stanthorpe Art Collection, Private and Corporate collections in Australia, U.S.A, U.A.E, U.K, Korea.

SELECTED AWARDS
2008 Preselected Stanthorpe Art Award, Queensland
2007 Preselected Tattersall’s Club Landscape Art Prize, Brisbane
2007 Preselected Prometheus Art Award, Gold Coast
2007 Preselected Outback Works on Paper Art Prize, Broken Hill Regional Gallery
2006 Preselected Redland Art Award, Queensland
2006 Winner Works on Paper Award, Warwick Art Prize, Queensland
2006 Preselected Outback Art Prize Broken Hill Regional Gallery
2005 Preselected Soda Gallery Small Paintings Prize, Sydney
2004 Preselected Albury Art Prize works on paper exhibition
2003 Preselected Conrad Jupiters Art Award,GoldCoast                       
1990 Winner Moree Art Prize
1990 Acquired at Heritage Arts Festival, Stanthorpe.
1988 Preselected National Women's Art Award, Gold Coast.
1987 Winner Dalby Art Prize.
1977 Winner Queen's Silver Jubilee Art prize

ARTISTS STATEMENT
The immensity of my childhood landscape gave me the space to imagine being in all places at once and to see vastness within the minutiae of life.  But, perspective can be a metaphor for how we view ourselves and others. Can the imagined experience of being at different viewpoints [even simultaneously] challenge us to be more compassionate towards ourselves and others? I am sure the ability to ‘see’ differing viewpoints helps us [re]discover ourselves whether we are an individual or a nation.

I admit to a love/hate relationship with the land because for all its beauty it can also be lonely, harsh and brutal. Whilst an affinity with the Earth, developed in my childhood, flows into my paintings I have to acknowledge that both my parent’s ancestors worked on the land or sea well before and after their arrival in Australia. As I have grown older I believe this ancestral experience with the Earth is a significant element in my imagining. This is why the idea of cellular memory from a familial viewpoint strikes me as important. However, since exhibiting in the Middle East I believe there is human-race cellular memory that knows no racial, religious or cultural boundaries.

To create my ‘landscapes’ I use various symbols, most significantly the trans- cultural/religious tree-of-life motif. I play with the tree manipulating its viscerality so it can be seen as many things without losing its ‘life’ element. What started as a family tree has now become an encompassing, time collapsing life symbol. All people [past, present, future] share the signs of life ie: heart beat and breath. We also share an urge for identity and we call Earth ‘home’. Fundamentally there is more that is the same than different. Interestingly it is the urge for identity which creates culture and religion, the very things which cloak us with difference.

It was these aspects of my work at my 2005 Abu Dhabi exhibition which stimulated the wonderful intimate conversations with people from all over the Middle East, Africa and Eastern Europe. The tree-of-life did not need explanation thus allowing conversations to quickly deepen. I discovered that my paintings are never finished because each viewer brings their own story and emotion and it is these elements which ‘finish’ my work. Like multi perspectives my paintings have potentially many completions. But, with an increasingly common and shared desire to save the Earth I like to think of my paintings as visual ‘prayers for the planet’.