MARINA STROCCHI               View Works

Marina Strocchi was born in Melbourne in 1961. Marina was exposed to painting from a very early age. Her father’s interest in the Florentine Renaissance and his collection of art books (Cezanne and Matisse were her teenage favourites). In the 70s she saw the work of Fred Williams, Murray Walker and John Firth Smith at Realities Gallery, which was in the neighbourhood.

In 1982,at the inaugural exhibition of Roar Studios, she met the artists from Roar, including her future partner, Wayne Eager.  Meeting them and becoming a friend was an education in painting in itself. For her it was a totally inspiring way of life with painting as the focus. Books on painting were handed around...children's art and Art Brut or Naif, Cobra painting from Europe, Sam Byrne....  New Guinea sculptures (a local collector had a gallery in Chapel St)  Limitless visual stimulation in addition to watching people paint in their studios.

Overseas travel to Mexico and exposure to folk art followed. She lived in Paris for two years and from there saw many the galleries in Europe. The Louvre with the Etruscan sculptures and the Museum of African and Oceanic arts were favourites. She lived around the corner from the Picasso Museum and the Pompidou. Then there was Spain: Miro, Picasso, Gaudi and  Switzerland: Museum in Lausanne Paris Art Naif and Paul Klee Museum in Bern.

Marina has spent a lot of time nurturing the art of others in Melbourne as a community artist – working as a screenprint artists – posters, banners, etc. Marina also worked in an art therapy workshop with disabled artists at Kew Cottages for a year, she also did a series of painting workshops with a group of disabled artists in Fairfield.

In the desert, with Wayne Eager she established the Ikuntji Art Centre at Haasts Bluff, in 1992. In 1999, Marina spent a year as a field worker for Papunya Tula Artists. Since then, she has also lectured and tutored in art at Batchelor Institute in Alice Springs, delivering workshops on remote communities. She still occasionally does painting workshops on remote communities with Art Centres. Marina has been steeped in the art from the central desert for the last 19 years. She and her paramour Wayne Eager have been living and painting in Alice Springs since 1999.

Marina uses acrylic paint and some oxides and binder. Her work has evolved and continues to evolve, with landscape as the basis of the evolution. All the elements in her work come from the wide and varied landscape that she has traversed. She has travelled, with the artists that she has worked with, to  three salt lakes in the central desert. She has also been privileged to see out of the way spots on seismic roads. The elements in her paintings are man made as well as pristine. Her colours reflect the seasons (hot or cold!!! )and the times of day. The patterns of nature play a big role in her current series. There is an attempt to create a feeling of the desert.