Painting a picture of nostalgia

Floral wallpaper, household items and furniture, colourful vases, and the perfume scent of flowers are some of the things artist Maree Heap remembers when she creates her work.

Inspired by childhood visits to family and friends’ farms, Heap is aiming to evoke similarly nostalgic feelings for attendees of her current exhibition, Wallflower.

“I’d always grown up around houses with those sorts of wallpaper and gardens with beautiful healthy flowers,” she said. “It’s what I’m attracted to.

“I love going thrift shopping too and it all ties together. I want to give people something to connect with and that triggers a warm memory in their past too.”

On show now until this Sunday at the Old Butchers Shop Gallery, Wallflower features 23 acrylic pieces developed by Heap over the past 12 months.

Growing up around properties from Ballan and Gordon, to Newlyn, where her father was raised, to her grandparents’ place at Millbrook, Heap said some of her pieces are drawn from her personal memories.

“I often do Google searches and I have a scrapbook and do a little sketch on the side for composition ideas,” she said.

“But some are memories from my past. I go back into what triggers my inspiration.

“For one of them, there’s a telephone on the wall and that’s because my dad used to work at Telecom in the 90s and I just felt that needed to be included.”

Subject matter in Heap’s paintings, such as a hanging telephone or vase patterns, are often directly inspired by items from her past.

Having studied art technology during her senior years at Damascus College and finding it an ideal therapeutic outlet, Heap stepped away from exhibitive practice prior to 2018 when she started displaying her paintings through her Instagram profile,
@mareeheap_art

Heap has been exhibiting for the past two years in group shows as a member of the Ballarat Society of Artists, as well as the Incognito Art Show which fundraises for disabled artist support groups.

Last year, she appeared in the Tool Group Art Exhibition at Kank Wolverang Records, and displayed four paintings at Ballan’s FlackPTO space in October.

Wallflower opened at the beginning of the month and is her first major solo show.

“The opening was amazing and so many people came. I sold half the paintings that day,” Heap said.

“I’ve been so humbled by the people who’ve come to support me. They’ve been able to tell me about how they’ve connected their memories to the paintings.”