Dragons and Other Beasties exhibition

By Graeme Compton

Dragon’s have been part of my life since childhood.

There are a number of early influences, including an Asian plate my Mum had hanging on the wall, featuring a sinuous, elemental dragon; the song sung by Peter, Paul and Mary, “Puff the Magic Dragon” – I loved that song as a kid and taught myself the tune on the piano; and, of course, the dragons of Tolkien and Ursula Le Guin, which I encountered from ten to early teens.

The moment I read The Hobbit, I was enthralled.

The Lord of the Rings and The Silmarillion quickly followed, along with A Wizard of Earthsea and its many sequels.

The dragons in these stories were cunning, intelligent, greedy and narcissistic beasts, capable of devastation, catalysts for change.

They showed up briefly, played a key role, then vanished (or were destroyed) leaving us wondering, wanting to know more about dragons.

Over the years, I have created many drawings of dragons, amongst other creatures, and for the past decade I have meant to hold an exhibition.

This year seemed appropriate, being that Chinese Year of the Dragon.

Almost all of my dragons belong to a story I have partially written and plotted over time – a possible series of books – and the younger ones have certain characteristics in common.

The conception and design has involved hundreds of sketches, thousands of hours of pondering and mark-making, years of scribbling, scribing and scratching out, in order to bring them into being.

Giving birth to dragons is a labour of love.

You have to be fascinated and really want to create something new and powerful.

The dragons on show in the exhibition are all my own original works.

The major works are all digital paintings – thousands of hours of brushstrokes with a stylus on a screen. No AI.

I like to use my own imagination and do my own work, it’s more satisfying.

Art is a communication between human minds.

The artist depicts a subject, the audience translates it.

The tools used by the artist are of little consequence, in regard to the potential message of the artwork.

If your tools do everything, then you really haven’t contributed much to the communication and the audience has no other mind to connect with through the piece.

In contrast to the digital works, I have a number of pictures created traditionally, using pen and ink, and graphite.

Essentially, as far as labour and skill are concerned, there is no difference between these and the digital paintings – they all took a certain number of hand and arm movements and a keen eye for detail.

The aspect of ink on paper is very tangible, though, steeped in age old practice, since the time of cave paintings and the use of sticks to sketch in dirt. It’s still my favourite medium.

I’m hoping that our community enjoys the exhibition, especially the first weekend, when kids will be able to do some colouring in!

‘Colour Your Dragon’ is on from 10am-noon on the Saturday, for kids who love colouring-in dragons.

A pile of my sketches which did not make it into the exhibition will be available for the young colourists to colour.

There will be pencils aplenty and the event is free.

It will happen in conjunction with Narrabri Art & Craft Society’s Verandah Saturday stalls.

The ‘Dragons And Other Beasties’ exhibition runs from opening night on August 16 until August 25.