Gordon Finlayson

  I was born in Newcastle (Mayfield) in 1934 and lived in various suburbs until 1955 when I trained as a teacher and was posted to Sydney  where I lived, worked and brought up  my family.  As a child, I remember only one art lesson at school but constantly drew in the back of my exercise books or any other scrap paper I  could find. I began painting  when I was eight, when my ceiling-hanging collection of bland balsa aeroplanes demanded colour.  Meanwhile my outdoor interests gave me a deep love of nature and especially the sea, often to the exasperation of my parents.

     At 22 in Sydney , I sold my first paintings ( “Germanic Legend” (w/c) and “Sunrise” (Oil)) at local council exhibitions. I further trained at the National Art School (Paddington), where apart from painting I developed a lifelong passion for ceramics under Peter Rushworth.  I spent 2years writing and designing art lessons  for 3rd- 6th class children for the Blackfriars Correspondence School . This was followed by 6 years working with primary teachers in the field to build their teaching resources and approaches.  I returned to teaching art at high school level and then spent six years  training teachers at Macquarie University. During the 70’s, 80’s and 90’s I continued to exhibit and sell my work and to travel to Europe to study the work of great artists.

    In Sydney, I became the president of an art group called The Arcadian Artists, the first of its kind,  where 30-40 artists  displayed their work  in 8-12 venues across the Hills District of Sydney. It was a very popular event attracting visitors from far and wide.

    My painting, in watercolour, oils, acrylic, and pastel focusses on landscape, seascape, still life, abstraction and mythical subjects. I work from nature but my subjects now come mostly from experimenting with media and exercises in scribbling, smudging, calligraphy and free paint application.