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Jedda-Daisy Culley

Art

Today we introduce the work of Sydney artist Jedda-Daisy Culley.

Working out of her Surry Hills studio, Jedda-Daisy paints abstract works inspired by the Australian landscape, and this week will be exhibiting her first show for 2016 at Mild Manners gallery in Sydney.

 

2nd February, 2016
Lisa Marie Corso
Tuesday 2nd February 2016

Jedda-Daisy Culley is an artist with a rich creative pedigree. Her father is Stephen Culley, an artist who, in the 1970s, formed iconic Desert Designs, an Australian textile print and lifestyle label founded with indigenous artist Jimmy Pike. The Culley family home became a creative hub where artists would often drop by and visit. As a child, Jedda-Daisy couldn’t imagine growing up and becoming anything but an artist, and took her future aspirations very seriously. ‘I would set up studios, working away at different drawings, paintings and sculptures for hours,’ she reminisces. This childhood fascination did not waver, and as a grown up Jedda-Daisy now works on her various creative projects from a studio in Sydney’s Surry Hills.

In her high school years, Jedda-Daisy went to study in Western Australia on an art scholarship, then onto COFA to complete a Master of Fine Arts. She’s been painting since she can remember, but things got a bit more serious when she graduated and began to exhibit her work. Her latest show Universal Love opens at Mild Manners this week, and includes a collection of vibrant expressive paintings inspired by the Australian landscape.

Alongside her art practice, Jedda-Daisy also co-directs Desert Designs, the brand that her father and Jimmy Pike started many decades ago. She says her involvement with the brand and its history with indigenous arts and culture has given her a deeper understanding of native Australian landscapes, inspiring her own practice.

‘I have been privileged to learn something of the intricacies of the desert landscape and the particularities of Aboriginal cosmology – the wisdom in how they view landscape in this county,’ Jedda-Daisy explains. ‘Jimmy’s visual archive has been a touchstone for me to enter this world and deepen my own practice and understanding of landscape.’

Universal Love by Jedda-Daisy Culley
Open from 4 to 14 February
Mild Manners
Level 1 / 499 Crown St
Surry Hills, NSW

‘Life-Force’ by Jedda-Daisy Culley, 229 mm x 305 mm, paint on board 2016. Photo – Luke Brennan.

The Design Files acknowledge the Traditional Custodians of the lands on which we work, the Wurundjeri people of the Kulin Nation. We pay our respects to Elders past and present.

First Nations artists, designers, makers, and creative business owners are encouraged to submit their projects for coverage on The Design Files. Please email bea@thedesignfiles.net