Video transcript
The Arts Unit @home Art Bites - ARTEXPRESS interviews - Belle Leonard

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BELLE LEONARD: My name's Belle. I'm 18. I live in Maitland. I went to Maitland Grossman High School. And my body of work was 'The Reading,' which was a collection of works around the idea of self image for teens, and just the way that you perceive yourself versus how you actually are.

It was very useful, because even before Year 11 as well, I did visual arts courses before that. So really, whatever you can get before going into HSC, grab it. Take it. Take it in. Because you never know what you'll want to do. Do all of the things that your teacher gives you. You might not want to do drawing, or charcoal works, or lino print, but do it. Because you'll get into it, and you might find that at first you might not like it, but you'll find that you are quite good at it.

Well, it did change. Like it will always change. My initial ideas, well, at first, because I'm Indigenous. My dad's from Northern Queensland sort of area. So I thought maybe something about that, because as half as white Australian and then Indigenous, I thought maybe something about that. But then I thought that doing something that was just about myself and my own personal journey in this sort of stage wasn't as impactful because it didn't really reach to a broader audience. And people couldn't look at it and sort of say, oh, I relate to that. Only sort of a few people would probably be able to. So I thought, try to broaden it, and do something that sort of everyone can sort of feel a bit more.

And my visual arts diary, it was helpful. You need it. At the start, it was great. Before getting into the practical, like actually doing the artwork, it was great to just sit it out and just go for it, whatever idea came to your head. If you were just sitting somewhere, just have it near you, so whenever you thought of anything I could just write it down, no matter how silly it was. It was also great for when I'm researching artists beforehand, and sort of styles that I like, and anything so I could sort of print off things, stick it in, just go crazy with mind maps and brainstorming. It's a mess if you looked at mine.

In the initial stages, it was hard to get people who were willing enough to be photographed for my artwork. It was a lot for people, because the artwork was about their identity, and about them and personal issues. I was lucky enough to actually get enough people for it.

There were a lot of people that, once they found out what I was doing, they sort of said, no thank you. Some people were just too awkward to go in on the day. Some people just didn't turn up. But thank you to the people who did.

After that, the actual doing the artwork, the painting, that was tricky, because I hadn't done much oil painting really before that other than sort of small things in class. But I knew I could sort of figure it out, and I thought I will be able to do this for my work.

There were just stages where it was, I'm painting, and the oil painting just didn't work. And things were just getting frustrating. And I didn't know how to work it cause I was still sort of in a learning stage of it. So talking to my teacher really helped overcome those challenges, because he knows so much about anything and everything.

So family helped as well. It was good to have a refreshing, like you think, oh, my mum and that won't know. They kind of don't. But it's good to talk to someone who has a fresh perspective, because they just go for it and know anything. So yeah. Just get as many perspectives. And that really helped.

I did not want to do collection of works. I wanted to do just painting. I just wanted to get the books that I was doing it on. I knew I wanted to do sort of the books. But I thought, I'd just have the books, have the painting on the books. That should be good enough.

And that changed drastically when my teacher was just, he said, step back. Have a look. Do you think people would understand that, if they weren't you and you didn't tell them? And I thought, yeah. There's not enough behind it to back it up. So that really helped, especially with the continuing metaphor of the work, which was, don't judge a book by its cover.

So, there were so many symbols in the end that just had to be there to really push the message. So, I'm not at all angry that I didn't end up just doing the paintings. I'm glad I did, because it really pushed through my ideas.

Michael Zavros, I really loved his work. He was really good. I mean, obviously I wasn't going to be able to achieve the photorealism that he has. But he was amazing. And just sort of the vanity, the idea of vanity that he sort of conveys in his works, and different perspectives, like to see something from another way.

I found Lin Onus in the beginning. My teacher actually introduced it to me. It's great. It's the whole, you see, stand back, and the first thing you see is just an image with just a reflection of water, some leaves, and stuff. And when you look into it more in all of his works, you look a bit more. You'll stand there and like come to learn and study it, and sort of spend more time with the artwork. You see that there's the Indigenous fishes, birds, lizards, and whatnot all through it. So Lin Onus was really cool as well with pushing the idea of spend time and get to know things before you judge it. So I really love that. He's great. And also Indigenous artist was just a big plus as well.

Students going into HSC or who are not far off and you're deciding what to do, come up with your ideas. Write them out. As soon as possible, come up and start thinking of ideas, as soon as you can. Even before, like if you know you're doing HSC visual arts, get started on some ideas. And as soon as you think of a good idea, stick with it.