54 ARTLINES 3 | 2025 55 PLANNING, INTUITION AND CHANCE PLANNING, INTUITION AND CHANCE PAINTING THE UNEXPECTED WITH GEMMA SMITH Earlier this year, artist Gemma Smith travelled to Brisbane to facilitate a multi-day workshop with three Brisbane State High School students. Conceived as part of ‘Wonderstruck’, with selected outcomes on display in the exhibition at GOMA, Smith designed the workshop to explore ‘painting in an experimental and participatory way’, writes Cosima Scales. Painting often involves a mix of planning, intuition and chance. Decisions about which colours to use, and how to apply them, precede each mark, and which may interact with the surface in unexpected ways. As they accumulate, new brushstrokes push a painting forward while obscuring previous versions of it, sometimes leading to the loss of treasured passages yet opening surprising new ones. Australian artist Gemma Smith embraces this uncertainty, often by following self-imposed rules or painting ‘games’ in the development of her luminous abstractions, which she says ‘take[s] the pressure off of the outcome of a painting, maintaining a focus on the process’ and allows for unexpected results. Smith is also interested in education, encompassing her teaching at Sydney’s National Art School and undertaking a residency within Newington College. She also worked in the education department of Sydney’s Museum of Contemporary Art at a formative time in her career. In April this year, Smith travelled to Brisbane to facilitate a three-day workshop at The Paint Factory in Yeronga, collaborating with Brisbane State High School students Jamey Learmonth, Sienna Moore and Emily Parker. Through the workshop, the artist invited the students to employ different approaches, which evolved as three distinct experiments. The largest of these is Chance Painting. It began as a group of ten 3.6-metre-long panels, narrowing to six as the experiment progressed. Each panel having been painted separately means that Chance Painting can be assembled in multiple configurations. The participants applied colours one by one, using enormous brushes and by following the rules of a dice game. The game determined which panels to paint on and how many brushstrokes to apply at any one time, which removed some of the decision-making and left results open to chance. During the workshop, Emily realised that ‘sometimes the accidents you don’t try to ‘fix’ can become the work’s most interesting parts’. Jamey added that she ‘was challenged by the lack of agency’ afforded by the dice game, but ‘surprised by what the unexpected could bring’. Sienna enjoyed working with chance, noting that she struggled with perfectionism, attempting to ensure that ‘each stroke was smooth and presentable’, before reflecting that the uniqueness of ‘each stroke . . . enhanced the artwork’. This rings true when looking at Chance Painting: the brushstrokes vary in size, direction and shape, some are short and bold while others are meandering, and many are embellished with drips or curls. When assembled, the brushstrokes form unexpected connections across the panels. The second experiment, Twister, allowed the students to paint unbound by rules. They used two rust-coloured brushstrokes (originally painted during the dice game) as the starting point for a free-flowing accumulation of marks. Twister arose from the students’ need to freely express themselves and explore different painterly techniques: ‘Jamey, Sienna and Emily broadened the parameters and brought unexpected elements to our workshop. They each had their own aesthetic interests which were important to investigate’. The painting developed through discussions about the work and its direction. The third experiment, Leftovers, was developed over the three days as a way of using up excess paint, which was applied in a relaxed, haphazard way. Smith describes Leftovers as ‘a surprise painting that allowed accident and nonchalance to playfully achieve a painted surface’.In the final minutes of the workshop, it underwent a dramatic transformation: the participants poured and pushed vast quantities of green and blue across the existing painting; within moments, most of the surface was covered and they agreed it was time to stop. Gaps in the fresh brushwork revealed flashes of bright colour from the preceding layers. ‘One thing that surprised me’, noted Emily, ‘was that with the layers of translucent paint, none of the colours turned muddy or mixed into a shade that didn’t balance well with the others’. The workshop participants conveyed that the experience gave them a fresh perspective on painting. The process of ‘loosely deciding’ on techniques and colours ‘felt liberating and more enjoyable than a heavily calculated [painting]’ for Sienna, while Emily said the involvement of multiple participants ‘helped me let go of expectations’. Jamey added that ‘being in the studio with a team of like-minded people and just creating was a truly wonderful experience’. In closing, Gemma Smith offered a surprising outcome, reporting that the students’ participation ‘allowed me to see the limitations in my own approach — which was exciting!’ Opposite During Gemma Smith’s painting workshop with Brisbane State High School students at the Paint Factory, Yeronga, April 2025 / Photograph: Chloë Callistemon This page, from top Workshop participants with artist Gemma Smith (far right) discussing the progress of the experiment Leftovers; the experiment Twister; and layering colours during the workshop, April 2025 / Photographs: Chloë Callistemon Cosima Scales is Programs Officer, Children’s Art Centre. She spoke with Gemma Smith, Jamey Learmonth, Sienna Moore and Emily Parker in June. QAGOMA would like to thank Paul Hey, Project Director at The Paint Factory; Aimee Gust, Head of Department (Arts) at Brisbane State High School; and Derivan for their support of this project. Catch ‘Wonderstruck’ at GOMA until 6 October 2025, where you can view selected outcomes from Gemma Smith’s workshop on display.
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