The artwork of Cliff Grigg evokes a narrative from a deeply philosophical core of the artist. The paintings leading up to his exhibition are compiled from the continuous dialogue and themes around urban construction, panoramas and scenes that we all take for granted. City sky-scapes bestow a radiance, reflections, and hints of harmonic lights and grids. Although he describes his work as neo-impressionist the viewer is content in it’s apparent contemporary overlay.
Cliff’s first oil paintings were landscapes painted from life in the bush outside of Armidale NSW. He moved to Sydney in 1979 to study art at Alexander Mackie CAE. Cliff was fortunate to have well known tutors, painters Alun Leach Jones and Graham Kuo but both had very different painting and teaching styles. Graham Kuo’s flowing and loose shapes compared with Alun Leach Jones straight and hard edged outlines were techniques in opposition.
Cliff Grigg’s eclectic journey has been complemented by involvement in the music industry which has further enhanced and inspired his cumulative themes. For 10 year5s Cliff focused on a career as a professional musician with Sydney reggae-rock band Spy v Spy. He was fortunate to visit international cities and be exposed to different cultures around the world.
A chance meeting in the 90’s with Brett Whiteley changed everything. Whiteley told Cliff he played their music repeatedly while he painted because it inspired him to conceive some “large orange pieces”, and said there was an “orange energy in their music”. This was the greatest compliment Cliff had received from an artist and this event became a turning point in re-igniting Cliff’s interest in painting.
Inspired by an artistic sojourn in Italy his ‘sfumato’ (dry brush technique and ‘chiaroscruro’, technique where he draws the whole image without colour, drawing towards the light from the shadow in the work creates a dream like quality , modern architecture is transformed into a purer resemblance. The artworks’ terminology are composed from renaissance
scriptures adding a mystique to the works.
