Chapter 5
It’s been a bit crazy busy for me over the past couple of months. After the Morpeth Event mid-March, I traveled north to Queensland to visit several small zoos and meet with wildlife carers. I was able to do both - and I am now working with thousands of new reference photos to use in future artworks! With the lockdown, I had to cut my trip short and head south before the borders were closed. These are certainly interesting times . . ….
On the weekend of March 14, I participated in the ‘Festival of Two Palettes’ at the Morpeth Gallery. It was really great to see some familiar faces, and to be able to spend some time with some of the other artists in residence. Although the ‘foot traffic’ was down because of COVID-19 concerns, there was still a great turnout and I was able to meet many new faces! Even with the looming threat at that time, the staff at the Morpeth Gallery did an amazing job in putting this together!
Although I did sell several pieces, there are just a couple of Originals still remaining and they can be viewed at the Morpeth Gallery website
I want to share something very exciting that has just occurred!
Belinda Harrison, a journalist from the Wangaratta Chronicle/North East Media Pty Ltd contacted me for an interview to be included in the Regional Extra Newspaper (published 8 -14th April 2020). The Wangaratta Chronicle is one of the key newspapers published throughout North East Victoria, Australia. The ‘Regional Extra’ is essentially the entertainment insert that is published weekly and is also provided to several local newspapers throughout the region. It was a lovely experience and I think the final article turned out fantastic!
Here is the “Feature Story” as published.
Playing with fire - a wild life
FOR Bobinawarrah-based wildlife artist, Maegan Oberhardt, the natural world and the native animals that inhabit it have always been part of her life, and now they influence her art.
Maegan spent her earliest years on an Angora goat stud farm in rural Queensland where chickens and horses lived along- side native wildlife species.
“Growing up surrounded by animals taught me to appreciate the natural environment and the creatures that live there and it gave me the opportunity to study their features, individual characteristics, movement and expressions,” Maegan said.
“It was easy for me to recognise the differences between individuals of the same species and when I had time, I would spend it drawing pictures of wildlife.”
“They became a part of who I was, so working with them now is nostalgic for me.”
Maegan’s family moved a lot, finally settling in Diamond Creek, northeast of Melbourne in 2010.
The constant moving and changing of schools meant that Maegan was quite young when she found herself completing her VCE at only 16 years of age.
Following VCE, Maegan went to university and completed a Bachelor of Design Arts through the Academy of Design Australia.
After university, Maegan tried to work out where she fit in the job market - as Maegan said: “a career as an artist can certainly be a mixed bag once you start putting yourself out there, but the trick is to just keep going, keep improving and keep an eye out for that shiny thing in the corner of your vision.”
So Maegan continued to learn and improve her technique, creating exquisite wildlife art for people to enjoy.
Unfortunately, ‘city slickers’ didn’t take to it as well as Maegan had hoped.
“Melbourne is known for its art scene but it is minimalistic and people want something far more emotive and shocking than another sweet koala,” Maegan explained.
In 2018, friends suggested that Maegan’s art might be better suited to a rural area and introduced her to the town of Bright, which led to Maegan holding demonstration events and spending the next year commuting back and forth from Melbourne and exploring the area.
“I found Benalla to be a rather spunky art spot and decided that somewhere between Benalla and Bright would be perfect to settle.
“Last September I moved into an old farmhouse on acreage in Bobinawarrah and my mum moved in with me to manage my art business since her background is in brand development.”
It’s from her studio in Bobinawarrah that Maegan is perfecting a technique she discovered during her university days when drawing hyper-realistic animals wasn’t very ‘conceptual’ and she needed to expand her visual library.
Using the candle as a base, Maegan developed, experimented, burnt, destroyed, and learned how to use a flame to craft hyper-realistic animal images.
“Once while working on a bison portrait, I nearly burned a hole through the nose - yikes,” she laughed.
“I have now refined my technique and, using watercolour paper, I sketch the subject and begin layering carbon soot, just like paint, onto the sketch.”
“I then remove layers by etching with various tools to render the shapes and details.
“A very similar technique used by Salvador Dali in the 1930s was ‘fumage’ but although the soot is stable, it is delicate.
“Once I have completed a piece (which can take around four weeks for an A1 size), I protect it behind glass.
“I like to say look with your eyes, not your hands!”
Maegan dubbed the technique ‘Painting with Fire’, believing it to be a much more descriptive way to describe the process and although she has experimented with adding watercolour or metallic highlights, she prefers to just use the soot as it’s ‘more challenging’.
“I want to give each animal a voice and be heard. I’m using man-made fire on a byproduct of trees which represents man vs nature and the animal life caught in-between - literally carved out of our carbon footprint.”
In November 2019, Maegan became a resident artist at the Morpeth Gallery in NSW and was featured for an event.
She is also a guest artist at Aarwun Gallery in the ACT and their exhibition entitled ‘A Hommage’, which has been moved online due to the COVID-19 pandemic, through to the end of April.
Locally, Maegan’s work can be found at the Milawa Post Office (open) and the Benalla Art Gallery Shop (which is currently closed).
“The Milawa Post Office is a fantastic supporter of local artists and stocks a number of my limited edition prints and greeting cards.”
The current pandemic lockdown has denied Maegan the opportunity to showcase her work at a Bright venue event or the demonstrations she had scheduled over the next few months but she has plans to get back out there when the pandemic is over.
“I would love to meet local wildlife carers and share their stories and am open to exhibition opportunities and local demonstrations or workshops.”
For now, anyone who’d like to peruse Maegan’s artwork, order limited edition prints, keep up to date with her latest news or learn more about the animals she features, should visit https://www.maeganoberhardt.com/.
Last of Us
Inspiration: The Australian summer of 2019-2020 is now being called “Black Summer” and is amongst the worst bushfires in Australian history with over One Billion deaths across our wildlife, both great and small. The weight of this destruction is just too much to process. I think it will take a long time to recover and I know our land and people will come back from this. The Fire had devastated so many species and even one of our most iconic animals; the Koala.
This piece pays tribute to those animals that had nowhere to go, so that their life and memory wasn’t forever stained by how they left this world. I wanted to create new life and something beautiful out of the ashes from something so tragic.
Read more here
River Dance
Inspiration: It seems so mysterious what goes on in the river beds around Australia, a whole other world just below the surface. The Platypus has evolved to be perfectly suited to its environment and though they all have these iconic features, they are very much individual beings. Learning how they interact with each other, they are far more intelligent than simple and you can see their affection for each other but also respect. It takes two to Tango but I don’t think people could quite dance like this underwater!
Read more here
Early Bird
Inspiration: A regular visitor to the tree outside my studio window is a Kookaburra named Karl. Occasionally I’ll catch him in his morning hunt with my camera at the ready! He dives at the ground with no fear and seems pretty content with himself when he catches a big one. I captured him flying back to his perch with breakfast, ready to head back for seconds.
Read more here
It’s exciting to venture into new areas in the art world! It has taken 3 months with enlisting 7 suppliers (plus final assembly line) to create these beautiful and unique keepsakes. Australian made and owned, these linen cards have been hand foiled and custom cut to fit their envelopes perfectly!
I hope you enjoy these as much as I did in making them!
Now completed, I can now offer the first two collections of ‘Greeting Cards’ featuring many of my artworks. Now online — read more here
Australian Butterflies Greeting Cards based on artworks by Maegan Oberhardt
Australian Marsupials Greeting Cards based on artworks by Maegan Oberhardt