Jo Davenport: Nothing But Blue Skies

Jo Davenport’s beautifully gestural paintings speak of an intense relationship with nature and an intimate experience of the artist’s local environment. Her rich, painterly depictions represent the passing of time, the transience of the landscape and the ephemeral nature of memory itself. Coming from a long line of farmers in the Albury region, Davenport is deeply connected to this landscape and the farming community in the area. Although she does not practice farming herself, she is an active member of Earth Canvas, a Regenerative Farmers Program that pairs well-established landscape artists with regenerative farmers situated between the Murray and the Murrumbidgee Rivers in southern NSW. The program has been running for around a decade and has recently established a trust offering artist residencies through the Wagga Wagga Art Gallery as well as funding to cover tuition fees for young people studying regenerative agriculture. A deep sense of optimism about the local farming community and a reverence for the natural environment is imbued within her vibrant abstract images. Layered and utterly beautiful, they demonstrate the artist’s innate and keen sense of colour, captivating art collectors and audiences alike with their palettes of golds, pinks, and blues. While connected to the tradition of landscape painting, Davenport’s practice moves beyond the literal or representational, shifting toward an interior, felt response to the sensations of the landscape.