1. 126 | mindfoodstyle.com
Artist Neil Frazer jumps from abstract to landscape as easily as between
Australia, New Zealand and Antarctica and is willing to go to any extreme.
WORDS DANIELLE SEITZ PHOTOGRAPHY JOHN McRAE
ENDS OF THE EARTH
N
eil Frazer is used to having feet in different camps. A product of two countries (born in Canberra; grew up in New
Zealand; now calls Sydney home), the artist also migrated from abstract expressionism to landscape painting. “I was
an abstract painter for 20 years; [my] paintings operate somewhere between figurative and abstract,” he says.
The viewer might at first struggle to find the abstract in his current work: stark, uninhabited locations are
depicted with a passionate realism and attention to the kind of capricious detail that only occurs in nature. But then
they painstakingly portray the substantial (rock, land, sea) and ignore or reduce the ethereal (clouds, sky), giving
the impression of a place suspended, removed from its terrestrial plane for display on a neutral background. “The white space may
create a recessive space without regard for atmospheric perspective,” Frazer says. He paints using rags, spattering; paint is sculpted
impasto-style, capturing the kinetic immediacy of the site. “The locations have a drama and energy that’s beyond scenery … that provokes
all the senses,” he says. “I’m interested in the way land is shaped by natural forces … erosion by sea, weather and tectonic movement.”
Frazer’s work, which fills prestigious collections around Australasia, demands a taste for adventurous forms of travel and takes
him rock-climbing, kayaking or chartering scenic flights, mainly in New Zealand and Australia. It has also taken him to the world’s
last true wilderness: Antarctica (“a view into another world; both frightening and fragile ecologically … I loved it”). Has any location
defied interpretation? “There are lots of things you can only experience in life. Painting seems insignificant beside reality.”
NeilFrazerisrepresentedinNewZealandbyMilfordGalleries,Dunedin,andBowenGalleries,Wellington;inAustraliabyMartinBrowne
Contemporary, Sydney, and Philip Bacon Galleries, Brisbane. His new show, Escapist, opens June 6 at Milford Galleries. milfordgalleries.co.nz.

2. FIC TO QUI QUI
TOUCHING
THE VOID
“I am a very
messy painter,”
says the award-
winning artist
Neil Frazer (right).
While the likes of
High Point, 2015
(above) will be
completed in the
comfort of his
Sydney studio, his
research takes
him to some of the
most inhospitable,
remote locations
in the southern
hemisphere, such
as Antarctica.
READ MORE
ABOUT NEIL
FRAZER’S
TACTILE ART AT
MiNDFOODSTYLE.
COM.