Ross Jacka

Once upon a time I studied at RMIT and majored in Fine Arts. It was an amazing time just to be able concentrate on art and coffee but my first awakening to art was in prep when our teacher Miss Coote got us to scribble some lines on paper and then colour them in as if we were flying over a landscape. In retrospect so many ideas were seeded in this exercise

While I started working in oil and have tried acrylic my favourite medium is tempera and this is the medium I usually use. It can be egg tempera, but at the moment it is a variation of my own recipe.

I normally have a process of stages that I plan to work through, but once the first mark is made and each subsequent one they all work in relationship trying to follow the thread of delight to make something that is ‘itself’. When it becomes ‘itself’ it may not be delightful, but it is true to itself. Continued inspiration comes from responding to implications of marks and colours that are before me.

These days I would call my work abstract drawing on landscape and still life to construct relationship and pattern so my art has moved from observational painting to abstraction; yet there is still a consistency of elements of composition and a sense of light throughout my work. As I go on I think the things that intrigue me, object and ground, shape and line and how they interact, I will continue to shuffle around as I try to find a satisfying set of dance moves with them.

Each Artwork is different so I tend to take the journey approach of keeping going to see what’s on the way.

While I don’t have a favourite piece of artwork I like looking at, and being surprised by beauty, in new and old works, however an ongoing source of inspiration for me are the ‘Ocean Park’ series of works by Richard Diebenkorn. All periods have art and artists I find are constantly jostling for attention.

As I reflect on my Art over the years I realise a highlight is my persistence. I will continue to make art and investigate the vein of visual inspiration which I hope leads to delight, maybe (?)