Bethany Mckay might have just made the shortlist for one of Australian art’s most prestigious endowments, but it doesn’t hold a candle for her compared with her Swan Hill art classes.
Not only were art classes where her journey in front of the canvas began, as a nine-year-old in Echuca, it is her Swan Hill classes that now drive her forward.
Teaching, Mckay confessed, “has always been my thing”.
She said if she was to leave the art industry now, she would not want her legacy to be her success in competition such as the $50,000 biennial A.M.E. Bale travelling scholarship and art prize – impressive as that was.
“I teach students and adults and the pleasure I get from seeing someone who says they couldn’t draw a stick figure suddenly realise they can paint is just so rewarding,” Mckay said.
“I run four, eight-week terms each year and have been very lucky with word-of-mouth making sure they are pretty well always full.”
That means up to 15 in student classes and 10 with her adults (“there’s just one of me so I’m making sure everyone gets personal attention”).
But despite her dedication, and determination, to help create future generations of painters, it was the Bale that catapulted Mckay into the artistic headlines.
She made the shortlist in oils and acrylics, with a portrait of her 18-year-old brother Solomon, her acknowledgment of realism, which she strongly favoured in her portrait work.
“In the painting of Solomon I overstated the colours I used, bringing purple and green into his skin tones, for example, colours which obviously aren’t there in the real world,” she said.
“The Bale is very much a classical competition, working within established teachings, with a purpose of recognising Australian artists who have demonstrated talent and achievement in traditional styles – including realist, figurative and representational styles.
“The art prize is intended to encourage, support and advance classical training of emerging artists (in their early to mid-career) at any stage of life, who are pursuing the study and practice of traditional art and who desire to study the works of old masters.”
Mckay’s work can be seen – large and small – across regional Victoria.
From a 20m long rural mural in stunning colours down the wall of the Bendigo Bank to, of all places, another series of murals across six walls of a Piangil toilet block, which she is elevating to a stunning piece of placement art.
She also does a lot of commission work (a la her murals) but it also involved portraits (her personal passion) and she was known to churn out some very quick art with live painting at weddings.
“I believe portraits give you incredible scope to tell a story, there’s so much you can convey in that sphere,” Mckay said.
“But I was still absolutely surprised when I was named in the Bale shortlist at my first try, it’s such a plus.”
Operating out of the Dandy Lion Studio, Bethany can be contacted at Bethanymckayart@gmail.com
