Rachel Coad, Tangerine, 2019. Oil on Linen, 151x151cm. Courtesy: the artist and Gallerysmith, Melbourne.

Flock is an ambitious series of figurative paintings by Rachel Coad, which revisit the warm, muted palette that dominated her early practice.

The subjects of these works are French backpackers who passed through Margaret River on their Australian travels. In exchange for board and lodging, Coad retained them as sitters in the studio, where she sketched, photographed and painted them.

In the absence of colour, Coad employs tonal shifts and obfuscation to describe the mood of her subjects and in doing so, divulges only the most evocative aspects of each sitters’ disposition.

Exhibition opens: 2–4pm Saturday 15 June 2019.

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