Peter McDonald
Artworks available
About Peter McDonald
Peter MacDonald is an environmental visual artist who has concentrated most of his work in the South Australian landscape. Previously a commercial pilot flying charters throughout Australia Peter is a self taught photographer who has incorporated both traditional and contemporary landscape techniques while documenting Australia’s shifting environment.
His approach to making images is to immerse himself in the land, live there, learn all as much as possible about the fauna and flora, the water and the seasons, the geology and the people who make their lives there. Inadvertently a considerable portion of his time as a photographer covered the recent decade-long drought which effected a large portion of the country. His photography was also part of a campaign to stop mining exploration in the spectacular and geologically significant northern Flinders Ranges.
Another significant section of his work covers a six year project starting in 2010 documenting the flooding of Lake Eyre and Lake Frome in central Australia.
Peter is an experienced aerial photographer and his work for the Lake Eyre floods was mostly shot at high altitude….each picture covering many square kilometres of the lake’s surface. This allowed an exploration of the textural beauty created by the meeting of the salt floor, salt water, rainwater and the surrounding desert.
He is also known for his abstract work which showcases the brilliant colours, changing seasons and seductive contours of the land.
His photographs will often elicit feelings of calm or peace, timelessness and an undercurrent of solitude and quietness, which reflects the emotions experienced when making the image.
A sought after photographer, his work has been sold in many parts off the world, been exhibited at the South Australian Museum and published in the illustrated edition of I Once Met a Man, a collection of Australian bush stories by R. M. Williams as well as many other publications.
Peter has been commissioned to supply artwork for the Visitor Information Centre at Flinders Ranges National Park, the South Australian Department of Environment and Natural Resources, and his work from the Lake Eyre region, the Strzelecki and Great Victoria Deserts, the Flinders Ranges, and the Coorong grace the halls of the new Royal Adelaide Hospital.
His recent successful Exhibition Infinity – Exploring Space and Time in the Landscape at the Mezzanine 55 Gallery in Adelaide received widespread interest.
How long have you been a photographic artist, and what was the journey you took to get to where you are today?
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As part of Select 18, could you speak to your relationship with the printed photographic image, and the collaborative process you undertake when printing with David at Master of Prints?
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What do you see as the future of your photographic art, both within the Select 18 collective, and beyond?
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