The Ambassador’s Island, 2012, Alexander McKenzie
Oil on linen, 167cm x 228cm
Provenance: Martin Browne Contemporary, Sydney.
Exhibited: Melbourne Art Fair, Melbourne 2012.
Alexander McKenzie was born in 1971 in Sydney, Australia, the son of Scottish migrants. He studied at the Julian Ashton Art School where in 1994 he won the inaugural Brett Whiteley Scholarship. He is best known for his evocative, complex landscapes of sharply detailed, imagined worlds. Filled with light and atmosphere, his technique recalls that of the Dutch Old Masters but filled with modern symbolism. He is a five time finalist in the Archibald Prize for portraiture at the Art Gallery of NSW and a seven time finalist in the Wynne Prize for Landscape painting (1).
Created solely in his imagination, McKenzie’s mythical landscapes are composites of the islands, lochs, and emerald-coloured hills of his ancestral homeland of Scotland; the ornate and formal Renaissance grounds of France and Italy, and the Edo period gardens of Japan. For McKenzie, the maze of symbols conjures a visual journey reflecting the decisions that all of us must make as we navigate the dense, complex terrain of our lives – from serene moments of quiet solitude to tumultuous times of rapid, fiery change (2).
Other works by this artist: