The country town of Gundagai in New South Wales, Australia, has its own unique feel – for years I’ve driven past it (the highway bypassed the town decades ago), seeing it over there on its hillside above the Murrumbidgee River, and it’s tugged at my curiosity. It’s only recently that I’ve finally given in to its call and taken the time to break my trip, drive into the old town and go exploring.
Originally a gold rush settlement, Gundagai was first built down on the flood plain – in the 1800s it was wiped out by a devastating flood, so they rebuilt on the hill where it stands now. Its heyday is long ago, it’s been slowly fading for a long time, longer than I’ve been alive I suspect. In 1984 the train line was closed, a significant blow as Gundagai was once on the main rail route between the major cities of Sydney and Melbourne. Walking through the town now, it still has tons of charm and character, but to me it feels like it’s ever so slowly falling asleep.
Hence I decided to try to capture that feeling in this painting. I show the town at sunset, in the shadow of its hill, most buildings roughly outlined making them a little ghostly, as if they’re already memories, emphasising the town’s impermanence. The old wooden railway bridge still stretches across the floodplain below but it’s quiet now, abandoned, its grey timbers weathering, the rail lines rusting.
Apart from the evocative feeling I wanted to capture, this painting was a challenge for me as I didn’t want to get caught up in painting all the detail of the town. Rather I wanted complete freedom in painting the surrounding landscape, using expressive brush strokes and intuitive colour choices, as if it’s an abstract artwork rather than a realistic or impressionist representation. Only once I was happy with the balance of the composition did I add the town in at the end. I quite like this approach – I’ll certainly look for opportunities to paint this way again.
Limited edition prints are available from my Etsy store.
