Different Strokes exhibition

Different Strokes – older people still doing it!

Two mature age women, who independently retired from busy lives in the city and moved to Halliday Shores Retirement Village at Black Head, have discovered a shared passion in art and painting, meeting each other at an in house art group.

These proactive seniors, Pam Tyghe and Jill Woods Edworthy, whose diverse styles in the creative arts are yet to capture the attention of the aficionados of the hard to crack art world, decided time may be running out waiting for fame and fortune to discover them! So they are biting the bullet and taking their own interpretations of art to the world. Well, locally anyway!

An exhibition of their collective works, vastly different in style and execution, is being held during February at Halliday’s Point Council Library.

Pam Tyghe was born in the UK and showed an interest in art from an early age. Working in London gave Pam access to a smorgasbord of galleries and she would often spend her lunchtime admiring the masters. Moving to Australia in 1966 and raising a family put art on the back burner for a number of years. After her family left home Pam returned to her passion finding watercolour her preferred medium. In 2002 she enrolled in a 'Visual Arts Certificate 1' course at Queanbeyan TAFE through to Diploma Level. Pam relished the journey through a variety of styles and mediums, ceramics, lino and woodcuts, printing and sculpture. Since retiring to Halliday Shores her favourite medium is now working in Pastels, and learning something new every day. Her portfolio is extensive and diverse.

Jill Woods Edworthy is an escapee from the Sydney rat race 3 years ago, and now enjoying retirement at Black Head. She can finally spend time developing basic art skills. She did show an interest in drawing and colouring in from a very young age but was certainly no child prodigy! Jill undertook Art as a non-examinable subject at high school but never felt she achieved anything particularly worthwhile to justify the pursuit of further training. Life in general till recently prevented Jill exploring various avenues in any aspects of Art. Busily involved in her children’s school activities, volunteering in community organisations, and still working in the corporate world until only a few years ago has kept her fully occupied. No time for hobbies! Those years however did allow her passion for gardening to develop and still remains so, one outlet at least for some basic creativity. Jill is also a keen amateur photographer, particularly fascinated by shapes and textures but is much more likely to pick up a paint brush now. Having not had any formal lessons lessons with rules to follow, allows a sense of freedom when painting to motivate her choices.
She has enthusiastically exhibited at every opportunity, achieving encouraging sales which keeps Jill excited about developing her individual style.
Whilst dabbling in water colours briefly, her love of working with favourite brushes and palette knife in acrylics on canvas, has totally captivated her.
Jill’s love of the water and as well rural scenes, provides her with plenty of ongoing inspiration.

This exhibition is open daily:

• Monday to Friday 10am - 4pm
• Saturday 10am - 12pm

Entry is free.