elyssmccleary

Windy Stereo at Nicholas Thompson Gallery

Im happy to share that my solo exhibition WINDY STEREO is currently showing at Nicholas Thompson Gallery (Naarm/Melbourne)

Exhibition Dates: 20th May- 6th June 2026 Opening 4-6pm Saturday 23rd May

The titles are read as sounds perhaps by the patterning of letters, akin to the way on sheet music there is a pp. This translates to presenting a feeling or tempo in dynamics of music standing for pianissimo, an Italian term meaning very soft or very quiet. At times my notations seem to be seen as mis -spelt echoes but i want them to give a sensation to 

 the colour’s speed and luminosity, and the letters to be sounded out slowly like varied sounds pacing along, much like the different speeds I've applied to the painted brushmarks . fff letters stand for forte fortissimo and mean "very very loud". I'm not a musician unfortunately , but I do like listening to and observing the sounds and shapes of  the world. I thought it would be a fun way to approach this little series of works, as colours can change all the time with their own dynamics and paces in painting.

Light spectrums and colourful abstractions The brush marks bring a tempo that is both in and out of focus and fast and slow in pace. Much like tuning into white noise loaded with spatial elements and reflective possibilities the paintings disperse flickering moments.

Elyss McCleary, Wwiisstteerriiaa ddrreeaamm sshheedd, Oil on linen, 138cm x 122cm, 2026. Photograph by : Tim Gresham

Naturally Inclined at Retractable Art Space

Naturally Inclined

Savina Hopkins, Elyss McCleary, Emily Simek, Mateja Simenko

Four artists showing work connected to gardens and the experience of nature.

Curated by Savina Hopkins.

LIGHT TRACES ON TILES

Medium: Mixed medium (mirror tiles, found steel reinforced mesh, sharpie markers, gouache, paper, copic markers) 

‘Light traces shapes over around and through the plants and trees. There are some built structures with fading paint, surfaces eroding with the rain and sun. The sky is bright framed by both Felicity and Vera‘s garden I overlook in the flat I rent. Across the creek I often observe the leaves’ everchanging compositions butted up against the concrete path. With sharpie pens, collaged paper, gouache, shiny mirror tiles attached to a found hard rubbish structure this work explores surfaces changing with the elements, layered shapes tresselled up a lattice for tomato vines. Standing in front of the tiles a face appears like when it brashly reflects in a car or shop window suddenly. I just laughed at myself - eek is that my face now - sunglasses please!! A step back or to the side reflects the sky again or what surface the little mirror tile is next to. Little shapes and colours.’

Install of Naturally inclined - Savina Hopkins, Elyss McCleary

Install of Naturally Inclined, Emily Simek, Mateja Simenko, Savina Hopkins, Elyss McCleary

Retractable Artspace, Light traces on tiles Elyss McCleary, photo by Savina Hopkins

The Cinematic Background at Nicholas Thompson Gallery

My solo show is currently showing from 11th -28th September at Nicholas Thompson Gallery. There are opening rinks tomorrow 4-6pm (sat 14th) all are welcome ;)

I would like to thank immensely talented friends Cerise Howard for writing the essay response and Carmine Frascarelli designing and building the steel components for the exhibition.

The compositions in The Cinematic Background unfold in a somehow familiar mind trip of spaces within spaces, reflecting arrangements of images as painted afterglows of the after image.

 Layers suggesting scenes of a felt composition of forms of systems, stacking to excess, facades and fused colours ask what is cinematic to each view point. This could be how a person or a leaf see things at night, such as a shift worker from the hospital walking home by early morning, the streetlight, tree and the little fountain they seem to see each time in passing, or the sky with its sonic collaboration with the sea. These notions reel off what seem like imagined pauses of a world where I believe the big feelings are circulating and cinematic to countless environments within their own sensations. 

 Some of the paintings are placed on metal components, staging a location connecting shiny structures of suspended colours to imprint the afterimage of so many images formed in worlds past mine.

Here is the link for more info:

Elyss McCleary

It was a lucky moment when the passing light reflected into the shed, I was in a camera obscura

2024 Oil on linen, 92cm x 82cm, Photography by: Tim Gresham

Spring1883 Art Fair - The Hotel Windsor

This week Spring Art Fair opens. I’m showing some new paintings with Nicholas Thompson Gallery alongside wonderful artists. Spring1883 is a young and exciting hotel-based art fair that draws on the traditions of the Gremercy Park Fair, New York to present the best of contemporary art practice from Australia, New Zealand and beyond in a luxury setting.

Here is link to Spring website for more information an to purchase tickets :https://spring1883.com/

Here is link for preview catalogue of artists works: https://www.nicholasthompsongallery.com.au/enter-preview/

Elyss McCleary Magenta 2 Speaker System oil on linen, 2023. Photography by Tim Gresham

Elyss McCleary Screen interlude from the made up film festival, oil on linen, 2023. Photography by Tim Gresham.

INTERVAL DIAGONAL Divisions Gallery

Anna Steele and Elyss McCleary present a suite of new painting compositions that play zig-zag actions across a thinking space. The works locate intersections of the built and natural environment that offer multiple horizons across the canvas. 

Observing and taking notice of the landscape forms the basis of ‘Interval Diagonal’.  Over time, this noticing has formed a correspondence between the two artists. They walk the same creek walk, traverse the same inner city streets yet their embodied memories are unique. These paintings, made up of several layers, reveal and conceal aspects to form landscapes that fuse the natural and the urban.

Both artists share a love of walking and seeing. Insights from the local streets, lockdown walks, found objects and night lights are reflected onto the canvas through making and remaking layers. These abstract works ignite a newly imagined space beyond the real to a picture-plane full of gesture and colour, and a physicality of paint that is directional.

Brushstrokes, drips, hard-edges and soft shimmering lines collage across the surface of the canvases. These layers allude to a mash-up of forms situated in the urban landscape; dense, with intervals of rest and a pace of activity. The interlude between layers of paint allows a thinking space to emerge within each encounter of these works.  

Image: Anna Steele, 38 Degrees And The Pool Is Closed, (cropped) oil on linen, 2023.

Installation of works at Divisions Gallery, June 2023. (L-R) Elyss McCleary, Anna Steele. Photography by Aaron Christopher Rees.

Interval Diagonal Exhibition Opening Friday 9th June 6-8pm

9th June - 9th July at Divisions Gallery

LINK TO DIVISIONS GALLERY/PENTRIDGE ARTS

FEVER DREAMS Group exhibition at Counihan Gallery

'Fever’Dreams' explores the fertile and shifting borderlands between abstraction and figuration. In the work of ten contemporary artists, figuration swells and ebbs away. Figuration surfaces here and there like alligators from the hot dark of the swamp.

Colour is lurid and mutable. It is the catalyst for the combustion of figurative imagery out of abstraction. Colour is also the vehicle by which that imagery becomes alien and elusive.

Nothing is stable in 'Fever’Dreams'. The works offer a fertile playground of shifting visions. In these visions, uncertainty and ambiguity are positive, even optimistic properties.

This exhibition includes work by Ingmar Apinis, Naomi Bishop, Mitchel Brannan, Harley Ives, Luke King, Elyss McCleary, Ted Mckinlay, Valentina Palonen, Bundit Puangthong, and Paul Yore. This exhibition is curated by Mitchel Brannan.

“I often think of how imagery is collected, remembered or responded to in the seen and unseen senses of our time here. Once when I was 16, I decided to draw a black and white photo from a library book.Since then I can return to this image in my head, etched in like a pop icon poster. Periodically I watch YouTube videos or read about his life.Sometimes mashed up scenes drip into dreams. I made these flat like stage paintings for and about Nijinsky, a reverie of set designs for portals of thought, desire and acceptance of the in-between spaces of movers and shakers.”


LINK TO COUNIHAN GALLERY

Elyss McCleary, Parts of a reverie tableau of watchers and dancers in the wings, oil on linen, 71cm x 83.5cm, 2023

Elyss McCleary, A narrow stage reminiscent of dancers carrying veils of paint, oil on linen, 83cm x 71cm, 2023.

Summer Artist Talks

Bundoora Homestead Arts Centre’s Summer Artist talks will be taking place in February. Im looking forward to the floor talk with the artists showing current exhibitions, and sharing my work for Outline Imager in the afternoon.

I undertook multiple site visits to record and respond to the light and colour of the space and the way in which it changed across time. The resulting compositions feature motifs and figures constructed and reassembled, that merge into spatial outlines with layered imagery. Glow of colour from the gallery’s unique lunette windows and other light sources move across surfaces within and throughout time sequences, whilst built and natural shapes circle within the room’s structure, shifting and changing perspectives through interactions between the work, the site and the visitors that move through the space.

Here is link for further info for the floor talks:

https://arts.darebin.vic.gov.au/whats-on/event-calendar/2023/02/summer-artist-talks-at-bundoora-homestead-art-centre

Elyss McCleary, Outline Imager, Installation of works at Bundoora Homestaed Arts Centre, 2022. Image credit: Simon Strong

Outline Imager - Bundoora Homestead Art Centre

I'm excited to share my upcoming solo exhibition Outline Imager, a suite of 4 paintings and support structures made in response to the changing light, and inside/outside shapes of the space.

There will also be an accompanying exhibition text available by the very talented artist and writer Madeline Simm.

Please join me for the opening event , or swing by for a visit whilst the show is on,
Opening event
Saturday 3 December2pm - 4pm

Exhibition runs 26 Nov 2022 - 4th March 2023 Open Wed - Sun 11am - 4pm

Bundoora Homestead Art Centre 7 Prospect Hill Drive, Bundoora, VIC, 3083

For more information about the show and new season of exhibitions opening soon, here is link

https://arts.darebin.vic.gov.au/Arts-venues/Bundoora-Homestead-Art-Centre/Exhibitions/Upcoming-exhibitions

Elyss McCleary, SCULPTOR (detail) oil on linen, re-purposed hardwood, 2022

The Landscape Show at Kyneton Ridge Artspace

-The Landscape Show- curated by Jordan Wood
opening 11.06.22 3-5pm
Kyneton Ridge Cellar Door
featuring:

Anna Steele Betra Fraval Clare Scanlan Ellequa Martin Elyss McCleary Kate Hodgetts Kylie Blackley Rebecca Delange Stephanie Hicks

“The exhibition ties to landscape in an expansive sense. It is impossible and infinite, political, immersive, charged yet supportive. Each artist takes in the landscape, exploring and probing with their motley collection of tools” -Jordan Wood curator.

Kyneton Ridge acknowledges the Taungurung and Dja Dja Wurrung peoples as the traditional custodians of the land present, and future, and extend that respect to all First Nations people.

i have some paintings in lovely group show that just opened on Saturday. The exhibition continues until 11.07.2022 at Kyneton Ridge Artspace.

https://www.kynetonridge.com.au/

Elyss McCleary LITTLE RAINBOW ON THE LEAVES oil on linen, 51cm x41cm, 2022

Selected works from FANDAGLE CHROMA/S at Scott Lawrie Gallery

I’m happy to share that selected works from FANDANGLE CHROMA/S will be showing in New Zealand.
Excited to be part of the exhibition at Scott Lawrie Gallery with 2 solo shows by Oliver King and Megan Archer.
Thankyou Scott for this wonderful opportunity and excited to have some over my paintings over in lovely space there
.
The Steelworks, Shed 10, 13 Coles Avenue, Mt Eden, Tamaki Makaurau/ Auckland
4- 22 June 2022

https://www.scottlawrie.com/exhibitions/

Elyss McCleary, Octet Loves Nine Again, oil on linen, 138cm x 123cm, 2022.

Bayside Aquisitive Art Prize Finalists

Very exciting news to be a finalist in the Bayside Prize. Delighted to have my painting amongst such amazing artists and looking forward to the exhibition.

Finalist Exhibition: 6 May – 26 June 2022

Tia Ansell, Joel Arthur, Nick Ashby, Emma Beer, Asher Bilu, Elisabeth Bodey, Peter Burke, Echo Cai, Martin Claydon, Geoff Coleman, Brett Colquhoun, Greg Creek, Sarah crowEST, Jonathan Crowther, Claudia Damichi, Ann Debono, Katrina Dobbs, Nikolaus Dolman, Craig Easton, Betra Fraval, Helga Groves, Euan Heng, Franky Howell, Dena Kahan, Sam Martin, Natalie Mather, Ian McCallum, Elyss McCleary, Angilyiya Mitchell, Philip James Mylecharane, Tinieka Page, David Palliser, Steven Rendall, Lucy Roleff, Lisa Sewards, Robin Stewart, Georgia Szmerling, Kate Vassallo, Jake Walker, Darren Wardle, Alice Wormald.

https://baysideacquisitiveartprize.com.au/

Elyss McCleary FEBRUARY NIGHTFALL GLIMMER GLAMOUR oil on linen, 138cm x 123cm, 2022

THESE DAYS @COMA Gallery, Sydney

THESE DAYS

Curated by Sebastian Goldspink

6 March - 28 March, 2020

Opening reception: Friday 6 March, 6-8 PM

COMA is pleased to present These Days, curated by Sebastian Goldspink, a group exhibition focused on painting juxtaposed with archival Video 8 elements taken from the curator's own childhood. 

Painting is about lots of things but perhaps fundamentally it is about problems. It takes a very specific mindset to grapple with all the physical and conceptual rigours required to render an idea visually. This exhibition brings together a seemingly disparate group of young Australian painters who are united in their passion for embracing the challenges of painting, of working through the problems. Painting is a great game that is ultimately between the artist and the surface. This exhibition is idiosyncratic. It is a selection that is based on threads and connections between artists. These Days looks at what is happening now but also what has passed. 

Catherine Clayton-Smith Emily Galicek Zara June Williams Jasper Knight Jack Lanagan Dunbar Tanya Linney Elyss McCleary Marilyn Schneider Laura Skerlj Elena Ortega Tolosana Julia Trybala Bradley Vincent. 

For any enquiries or the request a catalogue please contact : info@comagallery.com

https://comagallery.com/exhibitions/

First Floor, 71-73 Stanley Street
Darlinghurst, NSW, 2010
Australia

Artist talk, 7th March 2020 at COMA gallery with Elena Ortega, Tanya Linney, Jasper Knight, (myself) and Sebastian Goldspink.

Artist talk, 7th March 2020 at COMA gallery with Elena Ortega, Tanya Linney, Jasper Knight, (myself) and Sebastian Goldspink.

SATURDAY FEELS LIKE VERMILLION THEN CHERRY RED Stacks Projects, Sydney.

SATURDAY FEELS LIKE VERMILLION THEN CHERRY RED Elyss McCleary exhibition 28 November – 15 December, 2019
opening on Wednesday 27 November 2019, 6 – 8pm

Saturday feels like Vermilion then Cherry Red is based on portraits of ideas of colour and placement felt through a space
of colour synaesthesia. Colours and numbers resonate strongly when come to mind, based on learnt, felt, media, situations and wanting to re think and understand spaces about how colour is used and reinterpreted by us. These works have been recently made in the studio intuitively over a years duration, painted whilst thinking of a place, person or feeling in front of me. The found objects complement each painting and hold a relationship to what I call unstill lives; watching each other, existing together and reflecting ideas. The works question colour hierarchy and the weight and meaning of each mark.
Each mark re-evaluates the potential value in colour and how colours are constantly reinvented and reconsidered in
peoples’ experiences.

While synesthetes sometimes report they seeing colours in projected in space, they do not confuse their synestic colours with real colours in the external world, rather, they report that they are simultaneously aware of the external colour and also the internal synthetic colour. Merging the two colours in a painting creates an actual real existing thought of projected colour that does exist and reworks those that stand there already. Thinking about people, colours often remind us of some one, or
a letter ‘s’ for me always feels like red, and I see and slick cherry colour red when I see ‘s’ particularly if it is a capital letter. This makes me question why?

When watching forms that sit within space, points of fascination begin to support each other. The shapes and combinations of associated histories continue to perform meetings with each other. The gesture of the application of paint acts as a tipping point and form of slippage to this. The history of colour and how it is used manifests associations depending on my own experiences - or what I can only contemplate and imagine in others. Is a felt thing, learnt thing, an ignorant thing, a changeable and curiosity of possibilities. Saturday feels like Vermillion then Cherry Red continues an consideration of emotional states, reactions and observations led by an open responsiveness to environment through the making of the work document real events played up and pumped up with simple and complex gestural use of materials and paint performing with colour and space.

STACKS Projects is a not-for-profit artist run gallery and project space
​191 Victoria St, Potts Point, NSW, 2011
​Thursday to Saturday 11 - 6, ​Sunday 11 - 4

Wednesday feels like Hot Magenta, oil on linen, 85cm x 71cm, 2018. Photographer: Simon Strong

Elyss McCleary, Wednesday feels like Hot Magenta, oil on linen, 85cm x 71cm, 2018. Photographer: Simon Strong

The Natural Way, at Arts Project Australia

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The Natural Way considers how seven artists observe and work in their processes of art practice. Integrative approaches take on a wide view of sensibilities and thinking to each person. The sequences of works explore subject matter crossing the figurative, role playing, investigations of time travel, and essentially unique and individual ways of interpreting and creating.

Curated by Elyss McCleary, this exhibition evolved naturally with admiration and respect of the characteristic autonomy of how each artist approaches their process in and away from the collective studio of Arts Project Australia. This process of ideas and imagery encompasses a constant outflow of work, when seen in the studio and on mass, impressing of something bigger and expansive for us all to share and experience.

Jacob Cartelli Kaymay Hallas Danny Lyons Julian Martin Daniel Richardson Rebecca Scibilia Robin Warren

Opening: Saturday 26 October, 3-5pm
Exhibition: 26 October — 23 November 2019

Opening Speaker: Jeremy Eaton, an artist and writer based in Melbourne, he is the gallery coordinator of KINGS Artist-Run and the editorial coordinator of the Australian and New Zealand Journal of Art

Image | Daniel Richardson, Los Vegas inside Melbourne Museum in the 1940s, 2019, collage and paint pen on paper, 50 x 70 cm.

Image | Daniel Richardson, Los Vegas inside Melbourne Museum in the 1940s, 2019, collage and paint pen on paper, 50 x 70 cm.

ST FRANCIS Tristian Koenig and Black Art Projects

St Francis | Saturday 19th October, 2-5pm | One Day Only

Tristian Koenig and Black Arts Projects are delighted to announce the opening of St Francis - an exclusive one day only exhibition of recent works by:

Joe Hamilton Ali McCann Elyss McCleary Sean McDowell James Carey Ash Keating

The exhibition includes a diverse range of site-specific and site-responsive solo presentations in a soon to be demolished warehouse in Collingwood, which will shortly make way for Gurner’s ‘Victoria & Vine’ development. The exhibition derives its name from the fictitious hospital of the hit Australian TV series ‘Offspring’, filmed on the site of the exhibition, and which features prominently in a number of the artists’ projects.

Date: 2-5pm, Saturday 19th of October (One Day Only)

Address: 1-57 Wellington Street, Collingwood Victoria 3066, Entry via laneway parallel to Wellington Street, between Derby Street and Victoria Parade

For Google maps navigation click here

The exhibition will be followed by an informal reception at Laserpig, 9-11 Peel Street, Collingwood, 3066

Elyss McCleary I Arcade Plaza Wall | 2019 | Oil on linen | 140 x 125.5 cm

Elyss McCleary ARCADE PLAZA WALL, 2019 | Oil on linen | 140 x 125.5 cm

Otherworldly at the Egg&Dart

Adrian Baiada Elyss McCleary Mignon Steele

The Egg & Dart presents recent works by three abstract painters. Adrian Baiada and Mignon Steele join invited Melbourne artist Elyss McCleary for Otherworldly. Their works variously summon vivid densities and atmospherics through gesture and overlay. Each artist uses the brush to build marks, synthesise layers then knock back and resurrect depth. Surprising colour associations emerge, unfurling landscape spaces where the transcendental exists within the everyday.
The show brings together three divergent approaches that adjust our spatial understanding in landscape painting. With Otherworldly, we expect an immersion into a shifting realm of spatial colour as our eyes move from one sensibility to another.

The Egg & Dart, Shop 2, 1-3 Raymond Road, Thirroul, NSW, 2515 | (02) 4268-4885

Wednesday, September 25, 201910:00 AM
Saturday, October 19, 20193:00 PM

https://www.egganddart.com.au/exhibitions-1/2019/9/25/otherworldly-adrian-baiada-elyss-mcclearey-and-mignon-steele

Elyse McCleary,4:40pm Sof Eyelids, we wereRunning and Jumping around the Creek, oil on linen, 2019

Elyse McCleary,4:40pm Sof Eyelids, we wereRunning and Jumping around the Creek, oil on linen, 2019