Visual Arts / Journeys, by Marsden Art Group, at Smith’s Alternative, until October 27. Reviewed by BRIAN ROPE.

Journeys are about travelling from one place to another. They can be very straightforward, such as a short walk, or major trips using multiple forms of transport.

Some people speak of their spiritual journeys as they gain greater understanding of whatever faith they are exploring. All of us when studying anything are on learning journeys.

The Marsden Art Group members use various media. In this exhibition, each participant has interpreted the theme Journeys differently.

Smith’s Alternative is an interesting choice of venue. It is a well-known and popular arts venue that hosts many things – on this occasion an exhibition of visual art.

I felt that I was on a journey while visiting the show during its opening. A large group of the artists were present, enjoying refreshments and company. Meeting and speaking with some of them was part of my journey. It also was necessary to journey around the room to explore the art, sometimes looking at the pieces and reading their labels while standing directly in front of another person seated below the exhibits.

Val Gee is showing a linocut print, Long-necked Turtle. Margaret Kalms’ work is a photographic image in which rounded shapes repeat across it from a foreground human body to mountains and into the sky with white puffy clouds. She has sought to suggest that humanity is part of the landscape, vulnerable to it. Both pieces are interesting, but quite different, interpretations of journeys.

Other exhibitors have answered the theme differently; personal, physical, animal journeys, transport, migration, movement, contemplative and conceptual journeys are all explored.

The label with Ian Baird’s artwork tells us he bought a framed self-portrait by his sister-in-law, Paulina van der Linden following an exhibition which including her work, circa 2005. He took a digital photo of the image, then cropped it intending to turn it into a photopolymer plate for printing at some later date. It wasn’t until 2022 that a B&W photopolymer plate was made, inked and printed at a workshop he attended. He hand-coloured the final printed image in red.

I particularly enjoyed Marilyn Hutchinson’s interpretation – several digital photos taken on the move and her words on an accompanying label including: “When we travel… we look in the rear vision mirror to see the past, where we’ve been, or look ahead to where we plan to go. Sometimes life in the present is just a blur…, other times… favourite memories… loom large in our minds”. This car journey, a metaphor for our journey through life.