It is with great pleasure that Four Eight Four opens its doors again and it gives useven greater pleasure to do so with a wonderful suite of paintings by Phillip Allan.

Phillip utilises the many forms of contemporary camping equipment - tents, sleepingbags, tarpaulins and fold-up furniture in these complex and delicately constructedworks; taking on the self-imposed challenge of depicting late twentieth centuryfabrics such as nylon and terylene. The resulting images, (which at times evoke acinematic quality), are beautifully handled - enabling them to be viewed both asextreme realism and atmospheric abstraction – often, almost in the same instance.

These works also resonate in another way - reminding the viewer of historicconnections in the lineage of Australian art, such as Tom Roberts’ famous 1886painting “The Artists’ Camp” and images painted on the Victorian Gold Fields of the1850s by S.T. Gill.

But in the case of these new works, Phillip has inverted the view, as he takes us insidethe tent – to a very intimate interior space, in turn provoking so many memories ofour collective times spent “under canvas”.

We look forward to seeing you once again at Four Eight Four during the run ofPhillip’s exhibition – an event, like camping itself – not to be missed.