Naomi Bishop

Title :The Search for Lost TIme

Medium: oil on wood panel

Dimensions : 45 x 125cm

About the artwork:

The Search for Lost TIme is a painting based on some old images I found of recumbent stone circles in the forests around Aberdeenshire in Scotland. The painting is made up of two wood panels, each measuring 45 x 61 cm, the total meaurement when installed is 45 x 125 cm. The diptych and is painted in bright, acidic hues to give the landscape an atmosphere of the supernatural. The sky is green, like the aurora borealis, and the grass is pink and purple, not real. For many years I have been researching sacred megalithic sites and neolithic cultures, investigating the ancient purposes of these sites, their connections to astronomical events, and the rituals that may have taken place there. I am deeply fascinated by ancient cultures, ideas of lost civilisations and lost knowledge.
Travel is (usually) an integral part of my research and work. I have travelled to many of these sites where there are mysterious stone circles, arrangements or formations in Scotland, England, Ireland, France and Finland. I feel a sense of connection to these places and their history. As a result of the covid-19 pandemic, travel and real life cultural exchange in regards to these places have not been possible for me. I continue my research and my work remotely, reading ancient stories, archeological books and articles. Even going to exhibitions over the last 18 months has been an unusal treat, rather than a regular occurance. During the many lockdowns in Melbourne, in my suburban home, I feel disconnected from the wider world, from the mysterious scared places. Painting is a way of trying to forge that connection, imagining I am someplace else.

About Naomi:

Naomi Bishop has been exhibiting internationally since graduating with a Masters of Fine Art from Chelsea College of Art in London in 2003. Internationally her work has been exhibited at London’s Whitechapel Gallery, The Irish Museum of Modern Art, Dublin, Fondation Hippocrene, and Galerie Nicolas Silin in Paris, Arteles Creative Centre, Finland, and The National Univeristy of Taiwan. She has presented several solo exhibitions at Galerie Nicolas Silin, Paris. In Melbourne she has presented solo exhibitions at Blindside, Kings, Rubicon and Alternating Current Art Space. From 2014-2015 Naomi collaborated with Melbourne fashion label Tettmann.Doust, creating prints for two ranges Underland (AW14) and Vellamo (SS14/15)
In 2019 Naomi exhibited in Sydney at the Hazelhurst Arts Centre in The Land of The Green Ghosts and Graphics at AiRSpace Projects. She co-curated and exhibited in Microcosmographia at fortyfive downstairs Melbourne in 2020, and has was included in the not|fair program in 2017 and 2021. She has been included in significant prizes and curated exhibitions and has received grants from Creative Victoria, The Menzies Foundation, The Wellcome Trust and The Australia Council. Naomi will present her next solo exhibition Subtle Realms at fortyfive downstairs in October 2021.

Naomi was artist in residence, at Arteles Creative Centre in Finland in January 2014 and August 2015, and at Heritage Hill Museum and Gardens, Dandenong, and Hawthorn Arts Centre in 2018.

Naomi Bishop’s work is represented in the collections of The Whitechapel Gallery, La Banque Postale, Rachel Whiteread, and Pierre Pradié, and private collections in France, Spain, Germany, Finland, United Kingdom, Ireland, Taiwan, Australia, New Zealand, and The United States. Her work has been featured in FAINT, Gallery (NGV), Elle Decoration and Tèlérama, and Time Out and The Guardian (UK).