Mary-Ann Orchard

About Mary-Ann Orchard

Hi, I’m Mary-Ann, a visual artist and illustrator living and working in the midlands of Tasmania, with over 40 years of experience.

I enjoy creating images of the natural world, which provides me with an endless supply of inspiration.  For me‚ creating art is a natural and intimate process, working on a piece can be therapeutic and a quiet escape from reality.  My works are usually executed in acrylic and some of the pieces involve gradually building up the detail with very fine brushwork, using layer upon layer to achieve the desired result. 

Recently I have been dabbling in the world of encaustic art.  The encaustic medium consists of natural bees wax and dammar resin (tree sap).  It can be used alone for its transparency or used with pigments to colour.  The medium is melted and applied to the surface, building up layers of melted wax to create a scene. Working with this unruly medium helps to create spontaneous and unusual landscapes.

In 2009 I won the inaugural ‘Paint the Town’ art prize at Ross, a competition where your subject matter is randomly chosen for you.  I was pleasantly surprised to win as the subject was a historic building and it took me out of my comfort zone.  I won for the second time in 2013.  This time the subject matter was the Catholic Church, so I chose to paint the light which flooded through one of the beautiful stained glass windows.

I like to invite you, the viewer, to see nature through my eyes and I hope you enjoy looking at my paintings as much as I do creating them.