There is no inherent still life—everything is within the flow of movement and change.

‘The painting is not separate from artist, or viewer

And in both we see the other, as painter is viewer and viewer is artist’.

SYDNEY HARBOUR SERIES

Sydney Harbour has long been a source of inspiration to my works, from my early figurative lyrical line works to the many theatre productions I have designed for companies like Richard Roxburgh Burning House, Sydney Theatre Company, ATYP and Dance companies that have homed themselves on the Sydney Wharfs. The use of Ultra Marine Blue has been a signature of mine since my early days within the theatre, Ultra Marine Blue pigment is derived from the mineral Lapis Lazuli, within the theatre and historically within churches and temples, the colour is one of the only pigments that absorbs light, spreading it rather than spotting the light, this gift’s the illusion of infinity, we call it the magic colour as it halo’s the wall, object within an endless ghosting of depth.

For me Sydney Harbour affords a juxtaposition between the spell of the sensuous, the landscape and the ever-changing light upon the blue ocean, and the human made structures and forms that graphic the skyline and reflections. My interest is in the organic, and within symmetry.

Early influences for me are the Brett Whitely harbour works, the capturing of the lyrical line and the bold statements within shapes and form. This new series is somewhat a yearning for a harbour that holds itself within memory, within the tidal changes and within the depth of the unknown blue. The subtle tidal marks, the inherent reflection of the sky upon the water, and the transformational nature of water.

These works are a meditation on the semi-organic flow from the pigments chosen to the freezing of ice block to the melting and eventual stain/ mark it leaves.

Colour Field Art

It is such a pleasure when as an Artist I discover a title for a style I have been meandering within, much like when a stream of conscious label (title) comes for a specific work, there is a kind of abandoned safety that you have connected to those you may have never known or know. There is less of a separation and more of a sense of belonging.

It was finding Vivian Springford (1913-2003) who led me to the term ‘Color Field Painting’. I have never really known where to place my Ice Works, they constantly fascinate me, they seem to be forever young… in this I feel they are never ending within possibilities, where they could go, how they may form, there is a deep curiosity at starting with a figurative form (as in the shape of the block) and ending with a ‘Mark’. There is a part of me that is learning the craft of ‘Mark Making’ the non-judgemental marks we make within a semi-organic nature of our senses in movement.

Color Field Painting is a tendency within Abstract Expressionism, distinct from gestural abstraction, or Action Painting. It was pioneered in the late 1940s by Mark Rothko, Barnett Newman, and Clyfford Still, who were all independently searching for a style of abstraction that might provide a modern, mythic art and express a yearning for transcendence and the infinite. To achieve this, they abandoned all suggestions of figuration and instead exploited the expressive power of colour by deploying it in large fields that might envelope the viewer when seen at close quarters. Their work inspired much Post-painterly abstraction, particularly that of Helen Frankenthaler, Morris Louis, Kenneth Noland, and Jules Olitski, though for later colour field painters, matters of form tended to be more important than mythic content.

The Dot

The initial focus of my Ice-works is the dot, the circular block, the dimensional solid pigmented ice. Within is an exploration of the many and diverse complexities within the tiniest of statements, the many hues and textures in what, from a distance may looks like a dot of solid colour, or a fixed block of ice.

Interdisciplinary, immersive and participatory artist Gav Barbey freezes colours (pigment/paint) into blocks of ice. Colours frozen in water. Multiple colours lay static, frozen in time. Ice melts and colour flow to form multiple patterns, rivers, expressions, to eventually evaporate, dry and stain the canvas, a process of transformation within waters hydrologic cycles.

Gav Barbey is celebrating 25 years of his signature Ice Works—Ice Works are process driven works utilising frozen pigments melted. Gav’s Ice Works are both permanent works on paper and canvas and ephemeral works activated within the environment. 

Gav’s process sees him choosing a diverse number of dry pigments, acrylic paints, dyes, inks and natural colours derived from nature. These pigments are then laid within the water and frozen, from frozen blocks Barbey then places and manipulates them into a semi-organic interaction painting.

Ice Works are often immersive and participatory within their nature, video pieces have been created from stop motion works to videos created from the audience and participatory happenings.

There are the subtle conversations that take place through the process, between artist, materials and audience, each breathing a story into life.

As an Interdisciplinary Artist my interest is within the collaborative process, my practice is based on immersive movement, the invitation for myself, audience and medium to participate within the co-creation, to imagine into a process within experiencing the multiple disciplines we may call art.   

Gav’s Ice Works have been based on the idea that “When we bundle individuals into groups by labelling them, we so often overlook the diversities that make them part of any such group”.  

Over the past 18 months Gav has created multiple works within public galleries and the streets. In 2023 @ Hyphen Regional Gallery Wodonga, Gav asked the audience/ public to participate within the creation of 6 works, each of the 12,000 participants were asked to choose a small block of frozen pigments, place it on one of the 6 canvases and watch, contemplate and meditate on the transformation, from ice block to melting to finally the coloured stain left once dried. This work included 2 immersive video works and 1000 of Gav’s signature dot works.

Early in 2024 Gav produced 3 x 160 lt nature pigmented blocks for the streets of Sorrento Victoria, ‘The Fluidity of Not Knowing’ asked the public to participate within the observation of the melting blocks; the slow release of colours and natural pigments that emerged over 24 hours; these works coincided with a participatory exhibition within the creation of 9 works within the ‘& Gallery’ space.

In July 2024 Gav has been invited to create and activate 3 public works for the George Town Penang Arts Festival, these works will be based on nature play and nature sensory immersion, and will again ask the public to participate within the creation of the works.

These Ice melts are an ever-evolving landscape that is moving towards a new form.

Like all of my work these works are about movement, flow, and the meditation of the constant energy that connects all things into new life. It is about change, and the very perception of change.

Everything we observe is changing moment by moment… it has no inherent static nature… the illusion of state, a finite, is only a perception, a philosophy of the mechanics. For in my work that mechanical would be, the choice of pigment, amount of water, the freezing, choice of canvas, melting, temperature and environment, drying, light and atmosphere. The illusion in this is that it does not then consider or perceive the intention.

‘Impermanence’

What is reality?  What is still life?  Though we may look and perceive an image, we often as the viewer disbelieve, or mistrust the nature of conventional reality, change, movement, one emotive state may change dramatically or at a minimal alter within any given moment.

Stagnant- weather that be my works in a gallery space or in the mind perception of what a painting may mean, or for where an image has come from… is always in movement, in transformation, manipulated by my own journey, the audience, the environment, life. Like the creation a piece is always in movement, the environment always moves, mental and emotional states move, it is always transforming. No more illusion, no more attachment, no more control, no more suffering.

Flow, growing from one state to the next and so forth, continuum, life.

“Transmogrification… Grace… the figurative abstraction of a story that reveals itself to both artist and viewer; like the dance of a fire, the course of a river, the roots and branches of a tree, the meanderings of the mind, the meditation of the spirit, the playfulness of the physical; these works hope to celebrate rather than dictate what we see and feel within any given moment and the story we are influenced to put upon them within that moment”.

QUOTES ON GAV’S WORKS

It is almost like Alchemy… like a Science, yet we get to see the Artist within the work as well as the work within the Artist

Peter O’Brien (Actor/ Filmmaker)

I’ve collected Gav’s works for nearly two decades and have examples of his work from all the various stylistic approaches he has worked with.

I obviously appreciate his work, but it is his Ice Works that I want to refer to. What has captured my imagination with this approach is the combination of the result, and the actual process taken to achieve the result.

Gav does nothing by half, and it is the intellectual and scientific path that must be travel to get the finished result that can draw one in. Watching the creative process (which can take a long time), seeing the impact of the physical world coming up against Gav’s imagination, is exciting; surprising; and deeply satisfying.

Gav’s process is art and science – that’s a given. The result though, that is where it is all made worthwhile.

Tim Ritchie (Editor, Music & Presentation, Radio National)

Gav’s body of work traverses’ visual art, live performance, film, movement and spiritual practices. It is iridescent in nature, sometimes undefinable but always deeply curious, unapologetic and full of love and life.

Lisa Freshwater — Festival Producer/ Director- Sydney WorldPride/ Sydney Fringe Festival

Gav Barbey’s body of work is outstanding. A multi-dimensional artist who keeps evolving and growing. His paintings can capture an emotion or feeling and pass them on to an audience as if they were experiencing it firsthand. 

Lyell Strambi CEO Melbourne Airport

Gav Barbey’s work tightens my threads, joins my dots and brings me back together. His is the spiritual, the natural, and oddly visceral…
To witness, slip easily into, savour and… heal a little.

Terry C Serio — Actor/ Musician/ Writer

It’s tricky to assign words to paintings that swirl off the canvas and dive straight into your limbic cortex. Gav Barbey’s works are visceral joy-bombs that love-punch the heart and crack open smiles … pure joy.

Jeanette Cronin — award winning playwright/ actor 

I have admired and invested in Gav’s art for more than 30 years and we bought our first piece in 2002. Gav’s art adorns the walls of many rooms in our home and offices, they are a talking piece both within their figurative and abstracted forms. Gav’s art is not merely decorative, they are contemplative expressions of a deeper conversation with life.

Andrew Goodsall — Senior Analyst, Founding Partner MST Marquee / Treasurer Australian Institute of Policy and Science

Gav is a really amazing artist; I've always loved his work its very unique the way he approaches his art and I love the pieces I own!

Gracie Otto—Film and Television Director