Nancy Whittaker, Tarrangower Times

For someone who didn’t start painting until her fifties, Tricia Migdoll has certainly made up for lost time. Her exhibition titled ‘It’s Like Singing in Silence’ at the MANet Arts Focus Gallery, 27 Main Street Maldon, opens from 5pm – 7pm, on Friday 25 August and runs until 18 September. You are warmly invited to the opening. 

Tricia’s vibrant realism is the outcome of her major influences and years of learning and practice. She was self-taught until she attended two Master Classes in New York held by David Kasson. After which, she attended a Master Class in Phoenix held by Bill Whitaker, whom she described as a wonderful realist artist. Then later still, Tricia attended classes in Byron Bay held by Rene Bolten. Add to these experiences, her penchant when living in South Yarra, was to wander down to the NGV to study old masters and, in particular, Rembrandt and his use of chiaroscuro (the treatment of light and shade in drawing and painting).

Her subjects are mainly figurative, but she also paints very realistic still life such as the ‘Glass Half Full’ and landscapes like ‘Journey’s End’.  

In Her artist’s statement Tricia wrote, “As I journey through this wonderful adventure of the visual arts, I am constantly delighted and inspired by the great artists of the world. My tastes are growing broader by the day as I contemplate the wealth of art that is out there in all genres and mediums.

I paint anything that moves me. I often dream my paintings and am on fire to put the dream on canvas. These will reflect my deep love for music, and spirituality, and not least, my love for humanity. People are my favourite subject to paint and I find myself falling in love with my subjects.

I find the human figure, so beautiful and so perfect, in any shape or form – and so this is what I tend to paint most. I find myself studying the faces of those I speak with and delight in noticing the amazing array of different colours in the human face and the way light and shadow create perfect abstract shapes in all nature.

Creating art as you see the world around you in a new and delightful way. One notices the subtle beauty all around you, where once you may have missed it.

I love to lose myself in the process of painting. I seem to disappear, and Divinity takes over – and for a time, I am an instrument of Love. The process is like dancing with paint – singing with colour – giving oneself over to the possibilities to come. And finding an affinity with the subject.” 

Tricia is quoting the poet Francis Brabazon; ‘Art is an act of love in likeness of itself’.

And that’s not all! Just the week before her opening, Tricia acted in the Hobo Playhouse Showcase 2023, as recent graduates directed by Jeff Jones presented their work on Sunday 20 August, in the Maldon Neighbourhood Centre. Tricia participated in a dialogue between two women who were reminiscing. Tricia’s monologue involved her ‘talking to a woman married to a man who confessed to her that he wants to be a woman’. 

Tricia is delighted to be showing her work in the MANet Arts Focus Gallery, as she said, “Art should be seen”. It is the act of receptivity complementing creativity. Her art is the “genie that lives in the studio walls”. 

See all the pictures in the issue.

This article appeared in the Tarrangower Times, 25 August 2023.