The balance of line, mass and tone through Stargardt eyes is my difficult pleasure

Keith Rutherford

Keith is an Abstract Expressionist Artist painting and drawing in a calligraphic , automatic and spontaneous gestural manner to display mark making in oils on canvas and pencil, graphite, charcoal and gouache on paper and ribbed cotton.

 

The local coastal landscape and found objects key Keith’s Art.

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Keith grew up in the leafy Sydney Harbourside suburb of Mosman, NSW Australia. He graduated from Alexander Mackie College of Advanced Education, which is now the National Art School, studying under Artists such as Alan Oldfield and John Firth-Smith.

 

After completing Art School, Keith worked briefly in commercial Art with EMI. The constraints of the commercial world led Keith to look for other Art careers and he soon began his career as an Art Therapist at a Rudolf Steiner Centre.

 

In the late 1990s, Keith moved his young family from Sydney to the beachside town of Coledale, just north of Wollongong, NSW Australia. The local landscape inspired and motivated Keith and his passion for drawing and painting was re-ignited.

 

It was during this time that Keith struggled with an eye condition known as Stargardt. Out of this struggle Keith produced a 3 metre painting he entitled “Coledale Beach: My Guardian Angel of Visual certainty departs” which was selected for the 1999 Wynne Prize at the Art Gallery of NSW.

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Keith turned his struggle into a positive and pursued his mark making with renewed vigour and in 2006 was selected for The Dobell Prize for Drawing at the Art Gallery of NSW.

 

Now living at Wollongong City Beach Keith continues to paint and draw his surrounding landscape with a confident and spontaneous action through Stargardt eyes.

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Keith has been an Advisor for Accessible Arts (voluntary capacity) since 2017 .