Michael lives in Cairns and has been painting his favourite landscapes flowers and wildlife subjects in the region since 1982. He was strongly influenced by the famous author and ornathologist, Peter Slater whom he met at a book launch. A friendship developed and Peter’s encouragement inspired the paintings exhibited in the first Wildlife Artists exhibition in 1983.
Michael’s art career is shared with architecture. Watercolour skills were part of early architectural training and developed into mainstream art with subjects like the Queensland House before moving on to birds and flowers. Michael’s paintings have won the 2002 Cairns Art Society Open Award and the “Australian Artist” Challenge No 9 “Flowers and Garden” 2002, 2003 and 2004. Other awards include the Edward Koch Foundation open award 2005 and the Ron Ireland Watercolour Award 2005. Michael has taken up tutoring watercolour for the Summer Art Experience in Canberra as well as local workshops in Cairns. He established the ARTescape annual workshops at the Cairns Tanks and tutored there until 2015. His work has also featured in several issues of SPLASH.
Mike has traveled to regional Amelio Romagna, Tuscany, Sicily and Venice on a watercolor painting tours and consolidated his painting and sketching skills on site.
INFLUENCES : Peter Slater, Robert Bateman, Winslow Homer, Andrew Wyeth.
Interloper watercolour
Australian Black Duck. Watercolour on cold press
