This work is part of André de Vanny’s 2025 solo exhibition, The Diving Tree.

In his debut solo exhibition, André de Vanny presents a body of work that draws deeply from his childhood spent on Dja Dja Wurrung Country/Central Victoria, where the landscape left an indelible mark on his artistic practice. Through a physical and embodied approach to painting, each canvas becomes a reflection of de Vanny’s intimate relationship in the Goldfields region, particularly the arid terrain of the bushland surrounding Lake Eppalock.

Working from a palette of earth tones and deep tertiary hues, de Vanny seeks to reveal the poetic language of colour. In place of the parched earth, straw grass and ironbark trees of the Victorian bush, we see burnt ochre, sap greens, russet coppers and dark umber, reimagined in contemporary abstract form.

Whilst his subject matter draws upon the illusive qualities of memory and place, his process-based approach embeds a tangible sense of time and history into the work. Starting with large un-stretched sheets of heavy gauge canvas, de Vanny builds multiple layers of colour by staining, folding and drying the works over several months. This allows the natural evaporation process to push pigments across the canvas, generating organic marks that become held within the weave. By working outdoors, dragging, sanding and scoring the surface, he seeks to reveal the subtle vulnerabilities of the canvas, offering up the materials of fine art to the elemental forces of nature.