Featured Artist Terry Jackson

Australian Terry Jackson shares her incredible portfolio of wildlife artwork. Visit her website for more from this talented artist.

 

 

I had always loved art and had dabbled in it over many years (mainly in arts and crafts with my children) but I was a stay-at-home mum first and the foray into the world of the artist was never on my agenda especially when, in 2000, I became a single parent following divorce.

 

 

Then in 2005, a view towards doing something original and personal for my sister’s 40^th birthday led me to do my first serious artwork, a triple portrait of her done in graphite. She was thrilled, I was happy. But again, I had no thoughts to take it further.

 

 

However, nine months after doing my sister’s portrait I was given a Gary Hodges print as a Christmas gift. Rather than just seeing it as just a wonderful present, I studied it carefully and decided to play around with drawing animals. With encouragement and support from my partner, it was a decision that would change my entire way of life.

 

 

My first art show in 2007 saw me acquire the People’s Choice award for my piece “Pride and Joy”. I then went on to become a featured artist in Wet Canvas Magazine,  Nature’s Paintbox eZine and Artist’s Palette Magazine,  and have been juried into the Waterhouse Natural History Art Prize three times, twice receiving a “Highly Commended” accolade. In 2012 I was a featured artist on the TV programme “Colour in Your Life” and I am lucky enough to now have my originals and prints sitting on walls all over the world.

 

 

By far, my preferred media is graphite pencil. I find the ability to create an illusion of colour in a myriad shades of grey quite fascinating.  However, I’m not averse to colour and in my ‘Wild Whimsy®’ collection I like to combine the beauty of both graphite and coloured pencil. I have also produced work exclusively in pastels and coloured pencils. In the not too distant future, I’ll hopefully start to mess about with acrylic, oil and watercolour paints.

 

 

Though my work is in the realm of photorealism, I like to keep the creative processes fairly simple with my own favourite techniques for shading using stumps. Over the last couple of years I have also discovered the joys of producing entire works using a single pencil (Derwent Onyx Dark) to create the lightest of greys through to black and every shade in between.

 

 

I now work on “Venture”, a 38′ monohull yacht that my partner Dave and I live aboard as we circumnavigate Australia and as such, may be diversifying my subject matter to include boats (as requested by several people since we started on our Silver Salties journey) or dip below the waters to include sea life.

 

Terry Jackson invites you to follow her on Facebook.

 

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