Interview extract by Margot Magazine

Margot Magazine - The Colour Issue: RED featuring Natalie O’Connor

Photos by Eryca Green and Text by Laura Neilson

For Artist Natalie O’Connor,

red is more than a colour

but a primordial element that’s endured since the beginning of mankind

Is there any single color more provocative than red? Not as far as the eye can see. In all its various shades and hues, red is a color that confronts. It refuses to be ignored, invariably evoking reaction across an expansive emotional spectrum.

The Sydney-based artist and researcher Natalie O’Connor didn’t intend to write her recent thesis on colour theory, short-titled “The Nature of Redness,” about this particular pigment, but as she told us, “red chose me.” And while she can reflect back on an early love-hate relationship with the colour, it was ultimately a series of visits to Australia’s Mungo National Park in the Willandra Lakes World Heritage Area that inevitably turned curiosity into calling.

I’ve lived in, I think, 34 homes in my lifetime—a lot when I was really young. My parents flipped houses. My dad was a builder, and he would buy an old bomb and do it up— work up on it, sell it and keep going. I’m one of three girls, and because our bedrooms were just going to be demolished, we were allowed to paint on the walls, and do whatever and express ourselves.

I can remember an artwork I did when I was 10. I did this painting in a kids watercolor-type paint of a gum tree. And I can remember thinking, ‘The color’s not right,’ because I didn't see the tree trunk as just brown. I knew that it was this myriad of colors, and so my whole aim was to try and capture the essence of the gum tree that I saw in front of me. And it's probably the first work where I knew that I was observing color as I truthfully saw it.

“I got my first paint box when I was 11. It was a Winsor & Newton paint box. That became the precursor of almost my whole life—working from that paint box, trying to understand it.”

When I was 13, I decided that I was going to be an art teacher. I went around to all the universities in Sydney to work out which would be the best one for me. It was quite difficult to get into art school, because they didn't have many places in those days. And I just worked doggedly hard, and made sure I had a portfolio ready, and I got in. I can still remember the first lecture that I sat in on, when they were addressing all the new students, and this person said, ‘You came here because you have a passion for art. You also want to teach that art, so if you're going to be teaching that profession, keep art within you completely.’

“That became my sole ambition: not to become a teacher who had forgotten the artist within her, and to keep that practice going. It’s a really difficult challenge for teachers.”

I always say red chose me—and I believe that. There were pivotal points where I can see that it’s all interconnected. I remember, during my training, being required by a teacher to paint all my canvases red before starting figure drawings. At the time, I found the white canvas liberating, while the red one felt like an interruption. So I’ve always had a kind of love-hate relationship with red.

I had a friend who said, ‘You must come out to Mungo.’ I knew that it was in the outback, and I'd spent some time in the center of Australia, but I hadn't been to this particular area. Its significance is that it has the oldest known cremation on the planet there. It’s a unique place because it's a world heritage site, and its cultural heritage, and connection to Aboriginal people here in Australia is really significant.

The Mungo lunettes are a 35-kilometer series of dunes going around Mungo, and each one of those sand dunes have been eroded through sheep farming. The erosion actually revealed all this knowledge and life that existed underneath the layers, and right at the very bottom, there’s a red layer called the Golgol Unit. When I first went there, I was told by the archeologists that this is the demarcation layer of life—that there were no living organisms found in it. When I looked at that red and it was so hard and really, really “hot”—what I imagine Mars would be like—I sat down on the ground in the middle of this circle, and my son took a photo of me with my hands stretched out. I thought, ‘That was the oldest thing I've ever touched in the world. What color red in my palette do I choose to paint that?’

Watercolor allows you to play with this idea of dryness and different states, but it’s also the paint I say that has the truth. It's naked color. When you work with oil paints, the oil predetermines the way in which it feels. And acrylics have a plasticity that takes you away from the feeling of the color. But watercolor, you feel the particle you have there, and you can't fight it. You have to understand its inherent properties. So that became my whole mission: to work out what is red.

This article is an extract from Margot Magazine Issue 11- The Color Issue.

Photography by Eryca Green at Green Street Studios. Text by Laura Neilson. Many thanks for the opportunity to Margot Magazine founder/editor Simone Silverman

Adaption

“No person steps in the same river twice”
— Heraclitis

When I set out my plans for 2020 last year, I laid out the most ambitious plans for my research and practice… but like everyone on this planet, nature had its own plans.

I’ve had to see my research from a different perspective during 2021 and rather than expand my practice to locations across the globe, I was forced to more closely examine the work I had already produced and question my relationship and my place in Australia.

Twice in the last twelve months, I have taken the opportunity to return to the World Heritage Area of Willandra Lakes Region, Mungo National Park in far south western NSW, where I could learn to observe more closely… and listen more intently… to the voices of the country.

I had to ask myself how my understanding of colour has changed and how is it connected and informed by stories and my experiences at Mungo.

The environments of where I reside with my family and the place where I can make art can be in extreme contrast to each other but they are also interconnected.

I seem to have a broader horizon of life when I am watching the sun rise or set at Mungo. This ancient landscape confronts you with time. You come to realise when you are walking out there, that we are only a small particle in a very long narrative. This place can be harsh but it invites you in and also accepts you as being a part of the story of its landscape. I feel very comfortable and safe at this place.

I deeply respect and I am very grateful for the care this place and its people have given to me.

Natalie O’Connor at Mungo Lunettes observations the dry paper samples from Gol Gol Colour Observation #7 in situ against the oldest red layer of the lunettes, The Gol Gol Layer. Thank you to the elders and communities of Mungo National Park for shar…

Natalie O’Connor at Mungo Lunettes observations the dry paper samples from Gol Gol Colour Observation #7 in situ against the oldest red layer of the lunettes, The Gol Gol Layer. Thank you to the elders and communities of Mungo National Park for sharing their country and to Tanya Charles and other NSW National Parks staff for providing access and continued support to this unique location.for my art practice and research. Photo taken by Nicole Walton.


In contrast, whilst at home with my family I spend most days looking at the ocean. It is when I am placed in these two situations that I find it easiest to write about the interconnectedness of my life, art and place.

I’ve reflected on a diary entry from the last day of 2019 made sitting on ‘Sharkies’ Beach whilst watching my Husband , Michael and sons, Jack and Sam ride the relentless waves. It was an unusual summer in Sydney with a smoke haze that sat in the atmosphere and filtered the light. Somehow there was a sense of things shifting long before it became apparent to us all.

It’s hot dry smoky and the sand’s heat is coming through the towel to my feet. Cinematic Chillout is playing in my ears and the northeast swell is bringing in a high tide with an energy for the emerging decade. The sound of the waves hums along with the music. Each wave edges closer to me ~ tide and time. How many waves have there been in my lifetime? How many more? Why is it so hard to be with each wave? I’m like the surfers who are always looking to the horizon for the next wave, the next opportunity, the next opportunity, the possibilities to do something new or different.

Its hot.

So what possibilities will the next decade hold for me?

Just like the waves today? Each wave is a challenge but also an opportunity. Some waves roll in gently and others knock you off your feet.


The Beauty Of Burnt Sienna and It's Earthly Power

“Every pigment has a peculiar nature as regards to its effect on the eye; besides this it has its peculiar quality, requiring a corresponding technical method in its application” Goethe, Theory Of Colours

The beauty of burnt sienna and its earthly power. Observing it's sureness, brightness and depth. A latent colour Burnt Sienna PR101 a transparent synthetic i...

As part of my PhD research writing, Ive been re-visiting burnt sienna Pigment Red 101 of late. I know this colour well, or should I say, I’ve worked with this colour for forty years and I’m still learning from it. Burnt Sienna has played an integral role in my paintings, particularly as an underlying warm ground colour but also as a glaze that can unify a painting with the sheerest of veils.

The colour named, Burnt Sienna, can have different visual appearances and working properties. I am working with Winsor & Newton Professional Watercolour, the Burnt Sienna and it is classified as Pigment Red 101. This colour is identified as an earth replacement using a transparent synthetic iron oxide with a lightfastness rating of 1 and a AA permanence rating.

When I presented Gol Gol Layer Colour Observation #5 and #6 at Hazelhurst Regional Gallery, I included burnt sienna as part of the installation, as it is classified as a red pigment and its beauty can be seen in the Gol Gol Layer at Lake Mungo. The paper that was revealed after 2000 hours was much gentler in its saturation than I expected and the undertone of the wet colour in the glass vessel was closer to yellow than red. As seen in the video and images (below), I am repeating the study with Burnt Sienna for closer observation.

I have been working with Winsor & Newton Professional Watercolour Burnt Sienna since I received my first paint box when I was 11 years old. Burnt Sienna, in 1979, was a natural pigment that possessed the subtle qualities of transparency for glazing and mixing but in 1988, Winsor & Newton colourmakers could no longer expect the same qualities from the naturally sourced pigment and the introduction of a synthetic earth replacement became what I know is Burnt Sienna today.

Whilst conducting an acrylic colour comparative study in 2005 (where I used Burnt Sienna as a sample colour across five different colourmakers) I became unaware of how my understanding of the inherent qualities of the pigment, Burnt Sienna, was not a generic expectation for all Burnt Siennas. All its expected and inherent beauty of colour: its brilliance; sureness; depth and transparency; that I love to play with, were heavier, sitting with a more matt finish on the painting surface, and the colour mixing outcome provided me with a very different dark when mixing with french ultramarine. It is not that these Burnt Siennas are not good… but they are different, and their difference brings about an entirely different outcome.

So I could get trapped considering these behavioural differences across colourmakers and ponder the historical changes to the colour, but all of this seems inconsequential when I am standing in the studio, have the tube in my hands and I’m about to squeeze out a colour.

The 19th Century British colourmaker, George Field wrote,

… those pigments are most beautiful which possess the most colour, whether they be light or dark, opaque or transparent, bright or subdued. There are some which exhibit all their colour at a glance: there are others that the more they are looked into the more colour they are found to have - containing, as they do, an amount of latent colour.

So I am now observing more closely, this red called Burnt Sienna to know more about its’ beauty: sureness; brilliance and depth….its earthly power.

Keeping It's Place

Im in my UNSW Art & Design studio space today and whilst people are slow to return from the summer break, Ive seized the opportunity to spread out a bit and review a work that I started out at Lake Mungo in May last year. Initially, I wanted to have the work complete in situ over a number of visits…but this morning I felt differently about a huge roll of paper and the charcoal remnants next to my desk. I could smell Mungo. I remembered a place.

I regularly get asked and to be honest I also wonder why I study this colour in particular… some days I know and I can see the personal connections and other days I’m just baffled why I would bother, but I keep coming back to my connection of colour and country…PLACE

layers of earthly redness. a work in progress

layers of earthly redness. a work in progress

So I saturated the whole sheet which is about 1100cm squared and selected three earth reds; Burnt Sienna, Venetian Red and Perylene Maroon of Winsor & Newton Professional Water Colours and went to town with it!

I could feel the scars of invisible drawings done by sharp stones and sticks from my first time with this paper whilst working at Lake Mungo, NSW National Park. I could feel small grains of sand and clay. A memory of place.

The paper is heavyweight cotton but it becomes soft when its saturated with water and the red pigments of Burnt Sienna and Perylene Maroon soon stain through the surface and embed themselves deep in its layers. I did not used the Venetian Red. It is a beautiful red with a density and weight that is probably closest visually to the red of the pockets of dense red clay at Mungo but I felt that it was too soon introduce her to the work. The Burnt Sienna and Perylene Maroon need to have some time on their own. I want to see what they do first.

Ironically, I have called this post keeping their place, which is a reference to the nineteenth century colourmaker, George Field and his identification and advocacy of the inherent qualities of physical colour used by artists, one of these qualities being…keeping their place. The quality of a coloured pigment is determined by its dispersion with a vehicle (which in the case of my use of watercolour in the studio today is gum arabic) to maintain its stability and strength.

For these reds paints to feel like Mungo they almost need to be subjected to the elements as well…..water, wind, air, earth and time. Every particle needs to find its own place.

Im in the studio at unsw art & design working on a chapter of my thesis - the earthly reds. I have to make in order to be able to write...practice led resear...