Hera (A self-portrait with Hera and Zeus)

My palm presses into the surface of the canvas; my palm presses back in time…

Drawing on oral storytelling around the fire, the red flames invite a physical encounter between the viewer, the myth, and the artist. Painted in 2024, this work was exhibited for ‘Logos’ at Hazelhurst Arts Centre, a major group exhibition exploring Greek culture and identity in Australian art across six decades.

Can you see the scratches in the paint? The smeared oil across the canvas? I intuitively painted ‘Hera (A self-portrait with Hera and Zeus)’ directly on the canvas with my hands. (Yes, I wore latex gloves). Themes that carry throughout my work include symbolism, archetypes, and mythology. Swaying through the layers of time, the large-scale gestures in this work are a remembering, a story of my lineage that was unknown to me until five years ago as my mum was adopted.