I have just arrived home from my trip to France and Italy. I spent most of my time in France with the last week being a whistle-stop trip to Italy. I spent a week in Paris before spending two weeks in a house in the country in Provence. The time in Provence was the highlight for me. We were in an old farmhouse just outside the little town of Eyguiere. Using this as a base we took trips to Arles, Van Gogh's town, Aix-e-Provence and many neighbouring villages with their open-air cafes, rugged limestone backdrops and local small markets. Aix-en-Provence claims Cezanne as their own. A highlight for me in particular was seeing Cezanne's Mont St Victoire. Mont SV was Monet's haystack being painted by him again and again. The mountain dominates the skyline of Aix where he was born and spent most of his life.

I am putting here a few preliminary images from my trip to the Flinders last year. It was a dry but beautiful time. The flowers that usually colour the area in October were very few and far between. The drought had taken hold here as it had over vast areas of Australia

Europe

Next week I am going to France and Italy for the first time. I am very excited at the prospect of seeing "in the flesh" the works of art I have read and heard so much about. To stand before the Burghers of Calais, The Thinker or The Kiss. It will be amazing. As a painter I am especially interested in the graphic arts. I will visit all the famous museums and galleries in Paris. I will have two weeks in the south of France so will have time to go to Arle, Avignon, Antibes. I particularly want to see the work of Monet and Cezanne. The first influences my own art with his mysterious and subtle blends of colour. Cezanne had a true honesty and simplicity in his work. He honours structure and composition. To see his Mont St Victoire will be a privilege.

Images from my Flinders trip

I took many photos on my trip last year to the Flinders Ranges. Here are a few that, along with drawings, inspired the current series of paintings

Have been finishing and continuing work on a number of works based on a trip to the Flinders Ranges. The rugged rock lines jutting out from the soil and vegetation were striking. Hans Heysen walked through the area drawing and painting as he went. The Heysen Trail runs from the top of the Flinders down to the Fleurieu Peninsula. He summarised what struck me most about the Flinders country. He said that here "the bones of the country are laid bare". His two main inspirations in terms of landscape motifs were the Australian gum tree and the Flinders landscape. The landscape of the Flinders brings the visitor up against the enormity of primeval forces. My own works use texture and overlaying washes to emulate the ruggedness and exposed rock.

Have been sorting through images of my work. Am sending some works to a New York exhibition next year.

Why is it that we need to exhibit? Is it to communicate? Art is an activity - an activity in which the artist is at his/her most reclusive - and yet backing up instinct and bonding with the medium in this act is a lifetime of reason, emotion, intelligence and idiocy. We wrestle alone and helpless. We paint by walking into the studio each day and picking up and using the brush.

"When you start on a long journey, trees are trees, water is water, and mountains are mountains. After you have gone some distance, trees are no longer trees, water no longer water, mountains no longer mountains. But after you have travelled a great distance, trees are once again trees, water is once again water, mountains are once again mountains." Zen teaching.

"When my daughter was about seven years old she asked me one day what I did at work. I told her I worked at the college - that my job was to teach people how to draw. She stared back at me, incredulous, and said "You mean they forget?" - Howard Ikemoto

Bayles, David and Orland, Ted, Art and fear: observations on the perils (and rewards) of artmaking, Capra Press, Saint Paul, 2002.

My artwork began with working in fibre working from a studio at Salamanca Place in Hobart. I was born in Canberra and have since lived in Melbourne, Hobart and Northern New South Wales. From living in Hobart with it's blue skies and lush green hills I moved to Armidale, then to Moree and then to the country outside Tamworth. Now I am living in the country just outside of Armidale again. It will be interesting to see new artwork originating once again from this rocky country. I began painting as this art form seemed to best reflect the land. The land and it's use was a dominant element in my new rural environment. The granite and eucalypt colours of the Armidale area contrast with the Deep browns of the Black Soil Plains and the worn, rounded yellow hills of the dry Tamworth countryside. The colours of the land reflect the underlying geography, the farming use of the land and the effects of the climate on vegetation.