The Gardener's Folly

Date posted: 15 July 2014

The Digger’s Garden Shop, Schomburgk Pavilion, Adelaide Botanic Garden – map reference H14
9:00am – 4:30pm daily from 1 – 31 August

The Gardener’s Folly will be exhibited in The Digger’s Garden Shop in Adelaide Botanic Garden as part of this year’s SALA exhibition.

The exhibition is a collection of paintings exploring the objects and spaces that inform the garden – the watering can unused and rusty amidst overripe Autumn quinces, broken pots emptied of life or waiting to be refilled, espaliered apples juicy, turgid, restrained, a pair of muddied boots, a colander of ‘just picked’ chilies.

Artist Alison Mitchell is a keen but easily distracted gardener who readily admits that she would rather be painting than weeding. Her inspiration is her garden at Riverton that she nurtures and shares with her husband, fellow artist Robert Hannaford.

“The garden is a great creative outlet, yet quite the opposite of the interior of a studio. It is somewhere that we can wander out in to and absorb…the smell of the earth, the light playing on the leaves, the fresh air. Because I paint directly from life it is the garden that dictates what I paint and when,” Alison said.

For more information about Alison Mitchell and her work please visit her website.