Inspiration is the trickiest thing!. It can be strangely elusive when you need it and can pop up and catch you totally unawares. Its really handy as an artist to have a spot to go where you just know it will spark your creativity.
That place for me is Robe.
It starts with the long journey through the Coorong. During that 3 hours the landscape and light intensifies the colour of the natural landscape. The sky seems bluer, the vegetation colours start to separate into multiple shades, and the trees become more and more unique as if they are marking their personality onto a large flat landscape.
Like many of Australia's landscapes the sky just gets larger and larger and you get a sense of your tiny place on earth. The cloud formations change as the afternoon approaches becoming soft and fluffy like white candyfloss against a vivid sky
I have gotten over my need to scream STOP every time I see a dry lake with a pink flamingo pallette and just soak it in over the 3 or so hours that the journey takes.
Everytime we travel down its a different season and a different palette...but its always interesting and quite a feast for my eyes.
By the time we pull into our luxurious, beachy accomodation I've already left the cares and worries of city life behind and am ready to find something different and new to do with the camera. The sea air and snuggly bedding ensure a great nights sleep and I nod off knowing that the next day I'll hopefully discover something new and unique even though it might be as simple as a common shell with 25 different shades of blue running through it.
My good friend Jacqui from Jacqui Bateman Photography is an amazing host and guide and knows all the hidden gems in the area. We don't usually waste too much time before we've left the boys in the pub and the girls to wander around town and we are off location hunting and planning our next few days of shooting.
For me like always its a concentrated time of creativity, shooting, great food, wine and company. It never fails to satisfy and lasts a good few months after the trip.
PS I may not have mentioned the shopping!...this time I didn't shop too much except for a couple of bits and pieces from the second hand shop for one of the shoots. I did however go to 'holiday' as aways and just drink in the surroundings. The styling in that shop takes my breath away and one day I'd like to recreate a bit of that in my studio.
Im not going to name the locations because they have been hunted out but Jacqui is doing art shoots and she is the go to photographer in the area :)
Here are a few of this years shots. Thanks to Dani and Lucia for hanging in there and modelling in some pretty wild weather and thanks so much to Jacqui and Richard for having us xx
