LAST year, when the Yakkerboo Art Show announced Pakenham Portraits, a special competition in 2016 to celebrate its 40th anniversary, many local artists jumped at the chance to get involved.
One of those was Annette Slattery, a Pakenham native who quickly secured respected local artist Geoff Sargeant as her subject.
“Geoff is such an accomplished artist, I was a bit intimidated about asking him at first,” Ms Slattery said.
“He’s a very different kind of artist from myself.
“His work is very precise and detailed but I tend to be loose and occasionally impatient with my work.
“He’s very clean in the way he works and I tend to work more in a kind of organised chaos.
“And, of course, he’s a brilliant landscape artist whereas landscape is my Achilles heel.
“I suppose it was the differences between us that drew me to Geoff as a subject. Understanding a totally different approach to art was part of the challenge.”
“That said, it was also a major similarity that drew me to him. Like myself, Geoff is hearing impaired, in fact his impairment is much worse than mine.
“We’re both very visually oriented people who deal with significant loss of another major sense. In some ways I was looking at myself through him.”
Made with paper collage with additional mixed media such as three dimensional pencils adhered to the surface, Ms Slattery’s portrait combines a mixture of realistic proportions and cubist distortions.
Mr Sargent is depicted sitting, barefoot, in a deck chair in an imagined garden.
“I wanted to surround him with some of his favourite things,” Ms Slattery said.
“Like plants and stones and pencils. I even put a little rosella perched on his elbow as a little nod to the parrots and galahs that come up to his studio window and hassle him when the bird feeder is low.”
Ms Slattery has also reimagined a version of his garden gazebo.
Mr Sargeant, a successful architect until he was struck with career ending hearing loss, designed his Nar Nar Goon home which he shares with his wife Penny.
“His home and garden is so visually rich and inviting,” said Ms Slattery.
“I wanted to convey some of that complexity as well as portray its idyllic nature.”
A popular piece, the portrait got a lot of positive attention at the show.
“People really seemed to respond to the joy of the piece, which was really pleasing,” said Ms Slattery, whose piece went on to win the People’s Choice Award.
As the people’s pick, the portrait will hang in the Cardinia Cultural Centre for a month.
Art show president Jillian Ronald said she was already looking forward to next year’s event.
“Our next challenge is to equal or better this year’s show,” she said.
“We need a new special category to challenge our artists and new opportunities for the community to engage in art.
“To help people and artists locate the art show we have added Pakenham to our name and next year will be our 41st Yakkerboo Community Art Show – Pakenham. We look forward to seeing you there.
“I encourage all our sponsors to continue to help us with this great event.
“Without them we could not run the show and they are greatly appreciated.”
