The Paradise Problem: Painted Experience

• Main Authors: Angela Meyer, Stephen Naylor
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: James Cook University 2016-08-01
• Series: eTropic: electronic journal of studies in the tropics
• Online Access: https://journals.jcu.edu.au/etropic/article/view/3330

This research focuses on a sample group of painters who have worked in the North Queensland wet tropics where they have explored tropical imagery within western traditions. Despite some acknowledgement of the Pacific by Smith (1960) and some engagement by established southern artists in fleeting visits to the North; there has been little research into contributions of the contemporary painters working within the wet tropical regions of northern Australia. This research challenges some of the late 19th century and early 20th century filters established by the painters Gauguin, Matisse and Henri Rousseau in finding a tropical paradise, through the presentation of data collected from the selection of artists working in the tropics, teasing out the contradictions within the work of mainstream art historians.