After an almost 10-year hiatus, Gold Coast-based artist VR Morrison has returned to her easel. Morrison’s works have consistently looked to the rich tradition of vanitas paintings and morality tales, particularly that of the Old Masters. From the Renaissance to the Rococo, artists utilised a complex repertoire of symbols to convey ideas of faith, ethics and concerns with the hereafter that – while many are illegible to today’s viewer – were instantly recognised by their contemporaries. Still lives in particular were not merely an expression of the artist’s skill with figurativism and realism, they were often a reminder of the inevitability of death, and thus the importance of living a good and virtuous life ahead of judgement day. Morrison’s practice embraces the exacting style of these artists, the hand of the artist almost disappearing within swathes of clouds that would not look out of place in a Thomas Gainsborough painting. She is particularly adept at achieving the shiny sheen that the Dutch masters of the Golden Age so prized in their still lives. Nevertheless, her paintings also convey allegoristic messages on morality, though often disguised in dada-esque compositions that evoke the now cryptic nature of these once clear messages. Morrison’s figurativism is hugely accomplished in skill and style, defined by both its realism and its enigmatic meaning.
Above: VR Morrison, The Rococo Express, 2023. Belgian Linen, 61 x 91cm. Courtesy: the artist.
VR Morrison, Be with Me, 2023. Belgian Linen, 40 x 40cm.