OPENING EVENT: Saturday June 13, 2.30pm to 4pm

JOHN ELIJAH SULLIVAN

 Born in 1951 at Yallourn Hospital in the Latrobe Valley, Central Gippsland. 1977 - Diploma of Art & Design at Caulfield Institute of Technology. 1980 – Post Graduate Diploma majoring in sculpture and illustration at the Victorian College of the Arts. Up until 1987 I practised as a fulltime artist doing casual labour on the side. Life circumstances changed my situation to being a fulltime employee of various environmental park, land and cultural heritage management agencies and thereby becoming a part-time artist up until 2017 when I retired and finally returned to being a fulltime artist once more.

 My inspiration comes from a variety of sources, places and experiences. At times I will reflect on childhood and young adult memories and draw upon significant events from that era of baby boomers, sex, drugs and rock & roll. I can also be inspired by land and seascapes and the life associated with them while travelling with our caravan across this magnificent island continent of Australia. Then there is the sheer transcendent joy of just drawing/painting the serendipitous abstract manifestations that appear on a two dimensional surface. It’s taken me a long few decades to come to the realisation that I mostly find my artistic centre in the moment when the ‘Invisible becomes Visible’, where my own peculiar imagination is free to play and dance across a space of infinite possibilities.