Julia Flanagan, Pink Abyss, 2021. Acrylic on board, framed, 72 x 62cm. Courtesy: the artist and The Egg & Dart, Thirroul.

“Likingness brings the warmth and joy of Julia Flanagan’s work back to the Egg & Dart Gallery. The past year marks a progression to a vibrant new palette along with an increased complexity in the abstract language of her painting and sculpture. Through shapeshifting and layering references emerge – perhaps to a machine or the head of a figure, a flower or a passing thought – before resolving in an open state of potential.

The linework in these paintings is more intricate, fascinated and layered. An almost impossible level of compression takes place in the trajectory of these stripes and shapes, but it succeeds. Flanagan offers an embracing quality of positivity, further supported by the show title, Likingness – a rarely used word suggesting unabashedly pleasant associations between things, all while floating around the deeper challenges of making work.

Julia Flanagan exhibited as part of Sydney Contemporary in 2020 as well as collaborating with fashion label Gorman. In 2019, she won the Georges River Sculpture Prize with the piece Everything I Own. The show Likingness is Flanagan’s second solo exhibition at the Egg & Dart.”
– Melody Willis

Opening night: Friday, 11 June, 6 – 8pm

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