Talking With Painters Podcast
June 12, 2018
Steve was recently interviewed for the award winning art podcast Talking With Painters. Listen to the interview which gives insights into Steve’s working methods at:
www.talkingwithpainters.com/2018/06/03/ep-47-steve-lopes/
Gallipoli Art Prize 2018 Winner
April 19, 2018
Steve Lopes wins the 2018 GALLIPOLI ART PRIZE with his work ‘Exposed Wood, Mont St Quentin
Sydney based artist Steve Lopes has won the 2018 Gallipoli Art Prize ($20 000 acquisitive funded by the Gallipoli Memorial Club) with his painting ‘Exposed Wood, Mont St Quentin ’ depicting the overgrown WW1 battlefield of Mont St Quentin on the Western Front where Australian forces fought. Lopes’ winning work along with thirty-two finalist works will be on public display at Club Bondi Junction RSL in Sydney from 19 April – 27 April, 2018.
In his accompanying artist statement Steve Lopes said “The painting was done after a trip last year to the battlefields of the Western Front with 10 other artists. I was particularly moved by the area of St Quentin where the Australian forces fought. On visiting I found some old trench areas and abandoned parts of the battlefield.” “At the end of 1918 Mont St Quentin was the German army’s last stronghold – overlooking the Somme River and the town of Peronne. Mont St Quentin stood out in the surrounding country, making it a perfect observation point and a vital strategic area to control. A key to the German defence of the Somme line, Lieutenant General Sir John Monash was keen to capture it and possess a valuable position.”
“It was captured by an Australian operation and is sometimes regarded as the finest achievement of the AIF. The fight included battalions from every Australian state. British Commander General Lord Rawlinson remarked that this feat by the Australian troops under Monash’s command was the greatest of the war.”
In 2017 Lopes travelled to the former battlefields of the Western Front in France and Belgium with 10 other well-known Australian artists including 3 previous winners of the Gallipoli Art Prize – Amanda Penrose Hart (2017), Idris Murphy (2014) and Euan Macleod (2009). He was invited to exhibit works in the subsequent touring exhibition ‘Salient – Contemporary artists at the Western Front’ (www.salientwesternfront.com)
that is currently on tour and will be exhibited in Sydney at the Anzac War Memorial Hyde Park in October.
Listen to Steve interviewed on ABC Radio National Drive with Patricia Karvelas .
click link
http://mpegmedia.abc.net.au/rn/podcast/2018/04/rnd_20180418_1843.mp3
Salient – Contemporary Artists at the Western Front
February 8, 2018
Flat Markers, Oil on Canvas 40 x 50cm
Salient – Contemporary Artists at the Western Front
Steve recently travelled to the Western Front to paint with a group of leading Australian artists and has produced a series of works that will be travelling around Australia over the next two years at the following venues:
New England Regional Art Gallery, Armidale (NERAM), 23 March – 3 June 2018
Bathurst Regional Art Gallery (BRAG), 10 August – 7 October 2018
ANZAC Memorial, Sydney, 22 October – 17th February 2019
Bank Art Museum Moree, 5 MArch – 29 April 2019
Muswellbrook regional Arts Centre, 11May – 30 June 2019
Tweed Regional Gallery, 21 November 2019 – 16 February 2020
Recent Awards : Georges River Art Prize
November 7, 2017
Scarborough Park, oil on canvas 30 x 40 cms.
Steve has recently been selected in a number of exhibitions including the Parliament Plein Air Art Prize, NSW, KAAF Prize and his landscape work of Scarborough Park, a local haunt for the artist, was awarded the winner of the Local Artist section of the Georges River Art Prize.
Doug Moran Portrait Prize 2016
October 17, 2016
Dreaming of Filicudi , 100cm x 100cm oil on canvas
A Portrait of Steve’s partner Lesley, was recently chosen as one of the Thirty finalists for the 2016 Doug Moran Portrait Prize. The prize encourages both excellence and creativity in contemporary Australian portraiture by asking artists to interpret the look and personality of a chosen sitter, either unknown or well known.
Currently with an annual first prize of $150,000, the Prize is an important part of Australia’s Arts calendar. The Prize is acquisitive and the winning portrait immediately becomes the property of the Moran Arts Foundation. This years Judges were Doug Hall AM and artist Anne Wallace. This is Steve’s seventh portrait selection in the award.
Currently on show at the Doug Moran Prize exhibition tourining Nationally, 2017
http://www.moranprizes.com.au/doug-moran-national-portrait-prize
Recent Acquisitions
June 6, 2016
Broken Hill, South Side 170 x 130cm, oil on canvas 2014 – Broken Hill Regional Gallery Collection
Lopes’s work has recently been acquired by The Broken Hill Regional Gallery NSW (pictured) as well as the ANU Drill Hall Gallery, Canberra adding one of Steve’s works into their collection.
The Trip to Italy – Fiumano Fine Art
September 15, 2015
Recently exhibited at Fiumano Fine Art London, ‘The Trip to Italy’, was an exhibition of paintings by Euan Macleod and Steve Lopes. The two artists and good friends had a tough assignment: drive through beautiful countryside, eat lavishly, stay in exquisite small hotels, and paint along the incomparable coastline and in the historic hill towns of northern Italy. Their next task: head to London and immediately show the results of their trip – an almost pop-up-style exhibition replicating several other on-the-fly shows the pair has put together in recent years.
Known for their edgy painting styles, their latest works are an exciting take on the country we all fall in love with. These two inveterate painter–travellers ambled through paradise – with Italian–Australian Lopes as guide and translator – in a continuation of their series of plein air painting trips around the world. They started their journey on the Ligurian coast, moving down through Tuscany, to Rome and then Naples, producing a stunning array of landscapes and figurative works on the spot.
Both artists have works in the Australian National Gallery and in public collections around the world. Both have also exhibited in London to high acclaim. Macleod is an award-winning artist, credited with recent sell-out shows in Hong Kong, Australia and New Zealand. Lopes’s successful painting career includes a long UK association, as he has regularly exhibited there since living and studying in London in the 1990s.
Euan Macleod & Steve Lopes – The Trip to Italy
exhibited 29 September to 3 October 2015
Fiumano Fine Art London
Gallipoli| Steve Lopes – Documentary Film
August 2, 2015
Your Friend the Enemy | Steve Lopes on Vimeo.
In this version of the Your Friend the Enemy documentary, by respected Filmmaker Bruce Inglis, hear from Steve Lopes as he first encounters the surrounds of Gallipoli. Lopes discusses his efforts to create and respond to a landscape heavily imbued in history and emotion. Taking notes with his brushes, in this film Lopes explores the terrain shaped by a past that devastated it and Australian hearts 100 years ago.
The full length Documentary on the entire project and trip screened on Foxtel Anzac Day 2016.
An Exhibition and screening of Lopes’s Gallipoli works was exhibited in Brisbane at Mitchell Fine Art Gallery
Parliament House Art Collection Acquisition
March 10, 2013
Solarch Figure (2011) has been acquired by the Australian Parliament House Art Collection, Canberra. The work, a tryptich oil on board painting, was painted for the Not the Way Home project and was hung at the S.H. Ervin Gallery and at the 2o12 Melbourne Art Fair.
