New Beith local Murray Charteris is using his art to raise awareness for a noble cause, while taking a stab at Australia’s most prestigious art prize.
Mr Charteris has submitted a painting to the Archibald Prize competition, which has strict submission rules.
The submission must be a painting, it must be a portrait of a person, and the subject must be known to the artist.
Preferable, the subject should be a distinguished person in art, film, literature, science or politics.
The subject of Mr Charteris’ painting is Leif Cocks, an orangutan expert and founder of the orangutan conservation not-for-profit The Orangutan Project.
“I’ve been following The Orangutan Project for a while now and have been donating for a while, so it made sense to choose Leif,” Mr Charteris said.
Although unpredictable and nonconformist in style, his artworks usually involve nature.
“It’s a step closer to photo realism and that wasn’t really my intention,” he said.
“This one is closer to reality than some of my other ones.”
He said the theme of nature and humanity was something he had always been fascinated by.
“When we moved [to New Beith] 12 years ago, we were almost fully surrounded by bushland and now a lot of that has been removed,” he said.
“Seeing the bush being demolished around us has had a strong impact on my work.
“I’ve always had a close connection with the bush and the rainforest and nature in general.”
Mr Charteris reached out to Mr Cocks two-years-ago to see if he was interested in being the subject of the painting.
Mr Cocks agreed, and they arranged a meeting, before covid got in the way.
Finally, a year later, Mr Cocks was able to sit for Mr Charteris, and he took some sketches and reference photos.
He then began painting.
Mr Charteris said he was “beyond relieved” when he completed the piece.
He said it was his best painting yet, requiring “hundreds of hours” of work.
Although winning the $100,000 prize is the ultimate goal, Mr Charteris said he would be “over the moon” to be even a finalist.
Last year, 52 finalists were chosen out of 816 entries.
It’s a highly competitive competition, but Mr Charteris said he believed he stood a chance.
Finalists will be revealed on 27 April and the winner will be announced on 5 May.
