Carole Holmes

Through her artwork, Carole Holmes leads the viewer into a shifted sense of self. Her paintings create fluid motions between the present and the wonders of letting oneself go into a bath of warming colours.

Carole is never shy to experiment with and explore new forms of creating and connecting with new styles. Her abstract work results in mixed textures and materials, redefining her style and landing in “newly evolved abstractions,” as she explains. We can witness this readiness for new realms of creating in her latest work, Luma, Fleur Delicat, Vigueur, Blush, and Aqua Blue.

Her techniques for these pieces focus on using different- sized brushes, stamps and sponges and mixing acrylic paint with dried flowers, adding precious fragility and elegance to her work. When viewing Luma, we feel at home and secure, rooted and centred with Fleur Delicat, and clear-minded and ready to explore with Vigueur. While Blush inspires the viewer to find calm within, Aqua Blue evokes a feeling of fluent stability.

Carole’s pieces are artistically rounded off with floating and custom-made frames, allowing the paintings an autonomous existence and a way of standing on their own “feet.” They invite each observer to rest from the ordinaries of daily life and muster the curiosity of a child’s eye, taking in the world fresh and without judgment.

Her work is rooted in abstract interpretations and is an easy link to the Russian painter and art theorist Wassily Kandinsky. Both dive into the fantasy of shapes and forms and let their art be moulded by a seemingly moving arrangement of clear structures. A blending of clarity and softness creates a canvas for the audience to let their eyes be entranced by the different hues and lights—in Carole’s case, led into a bed of abstractions. This intriguing combination of precise forms and drifting sensations of colour and shadow allows the viewer to experience the creative process as an experience shared by the artist and the audience. It is rooted in the abstractions of lived experience, happening at different times but in the same reality.

Carole Holmes is an Australian-based artist who is deeply inspired by nature and takes in viewpoints during hikes. Her broad interests include creating landscapes and seascapes, as well as her current abstract works. Carole’s career expands to dental and interior decorator, and her work has been exhibited in Art Walk 2020.

Carole Holmes is the Silver Artist of the ArtAscent Abstract call for artists. To see the full body of work and profile, get a copy of the ArtAscent Art & Literature Journal Abstract issue.