Louise Feneley

Based in Adelaide’s sea-side suburb of Marino, Louise Feneley draws her inspiration from the sea and the symbiotic relationship between humans and nature. Not too dissimilarly to the grand tradition of the nineteenth-century Romanticists, she portrays the powerful immensity of the ocean and the comparable fragility of human experience. The swirling movement of wind and water influence her landscape paintings, many of which appear to exist in a numinous space between the water and the land. The artist’s still-lifes can also be interpreted as a reflection upon nature’s duality as giver and destroyer: the bounty and detritus alternate in a continuous journey of artistic explorations.

The paintings are finely executed, demonstrating the smoothness of surface that belies the evidence of human touch. Atmospheric effects are minutely observed and carefully captured. The challenge of conveying translucency with opaque materials on a two-dimensional canvass can be observed in a breath-taking detail in the paintings of waves as well as glass objects. An eagle-eyed observer will be rewarded with a gift of discovering miniature human figures in foetal positions caught up in the maelstrom of nature. 

Louise Feneley, painter of portraits, landscapes, and still-lifes, has been exhibiting regularly since the 1970s in Adelaide, Melbourne, and Sydney. Her works have been included in important curated and survey exhibitions of contemporary Australian art, including at SASA Gallery in Adelaide, Gippsland Art Gallery in Sale (Vic), and the Parliament House in Canberra. Louise’s works had been selected as finalists in numerous art prizes, and on many occasions she had walked away with the highly coveted ‘People’s Choice Award.’ Louise’s works are to be found in the Parliament House in Canberra, as well as in selected regional, tertiary, and corporate collections in Australia and abroad.