The Berry Eaters, 2014, Josh Robbins
Oil, charcoal and floor stain on linen, 130cm x 90cm
Provenance: Flinders Lane Gallery, Melbourne.
After two decades working in advertising as an art director, Josh Robbins took his painting from a hobby to his main focus in 2007. Each of his works as a blind drawing, and his intent wasn’t to paint the birds he’s become known for, but the trees he was painting seemed empty and without life. His aim is to express nothing more or less than beauty and the aesthetic ideal.
His feathered creations reference birds that are familiar in our repertoire – a white heron cranes its neck, perched on a branch that extends from the water below; a barn owl sits silently, poised, its eyes flashing as it settles on the limb of an Australian Snow Gum, and smaller finches flutter over an arbour that glistens with moss moist from tropical rains. But due to his free-form approach to painting he thrusts these new species into our imaginations. And there, they take flight (1).