Wānaka artist Robyn Bardas’s exploration of Southern landscapes has been travelling around the South Island.

The artist is currently exhibiting her ‘Red. Tussock. Line.’ series at the Central Stories Museum and Art Gallery in Alexandra.

Robyn has lived, worked and exhibited from Wānaka since 1997, and has most recently been showing ongoing iterations of her landscape series around the South Island, including at the Millenium Public Art Gallery in Blenheim; Eastern Southland Gallery, Gore; Forrester Gallery, Oamaru; Ashburton Public Art Gallery; and now Central Stories.

“My work is based in this landscape and is about how we place ourselves within our landscape,” Robyn told the Wānaka App. 

The ‘Red. Tussock. Line.’ series was initiated during a four day residency at the Pukerau Red Tussock Scientific Reserve near Gore, and the works pay homage to the survival of the protected plants. 

The tiny reserve - a reminder of an earlier southern landscape - is surrounded by farmland and denuded hills.

The works pay homage to the survival of the Red Tussock. 

Robyn explained how the work “layers time” both physically (she took videos, selected stills, printed them digitally, then painted on top) as well as metaphorically.

“There are thousands of horizontal lines in the work, which is itself a horizontal line. In classical perspective your eye level dictates the horizon line, so every horizon line is unique to an individual time, place, and viewpoint.”

As people move along the work they experience different horizon lines continuously, and are either “drawn into the distance or pushed to the surface, so it becomes a bodily experience for the viewer too”, she said.

Robyn has a BA Fine Art from Melbourne RMIT, and a Masters in Fine Art from the Dunedin School of Art (where she won the Dean’s drawing prize). 

Robyn is also a student and teacher of classical drawing and has taught for about five years for the Otago Polytechnic in Wānaka. She also takes portrait commissions.

Locals can take a cultural stop at the Central Stories Museum and Art Gallery in Alexandra for ‘Red. Tussock. Line.’ until January 2. Find more on Robyn’s Instagram (robyn_bardas_artist).

PHOTOS: Supplied