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Join us for opening night, Thursday June 1st, 6:30-8:30pm​

A female abstract painter and contemporary artist, Mitchell challenges daily the preconceptions of an old medium, and the heavy masculine association with abstract expressionism. Mitchell’s intuitive technique allows for an alchemical emergence. Mitchell works are full of passion, intensity and a lust for life. Her paintings are impressive – usually between 220 cm X 180cm – compelling, engaging, evocative, and grand.

At age 19, Mitchell was invited to exhibit at the former Artistry Galleries on High Street, in Armadale. She has undertaken four exhibitions since then. Buoyed by the success of her first solo show, SKIN in 2014, which comprised ten works, Mitchell decided to travel to New York to meet world-renowned painter Max Gimblett who was exhibiting with Damien Hirst. She was hoping to secure a mentorship with New Zealand born, New York resident, Gimblett whose genius compelled her but Gimblett’s only mentorship involved persuading her that she was ready to begin her journey in art without a mentor.

During a particularly cold winter in her Williamsburg studio, in New York, Mitchell created her second solo show which some cited as ‘a tempestuous series.’ Entitled, CHRYSALIS, it was met with great enthusiasm and culminated in the prestigious Parson’s School of Design in New York inviting her to exhibit for them. Her subsequent shows: Helm, and Swoon were equally well received and sold out.

Mitchell’s art is held by private collectors and corporations and Australia’s Art Nomad holds several works. Mitchell sells internationally and locally. She completed a double degree B.V.A. in Visual Arts, and in Arts from Monash University, with a double major in English Literature, and Painting. After travelling to Europe, Israel, America, South Korea and Japan, Mitchell returned to Australia for work commissioned by CHANEL.

In the most reflective body of work produced to date, abstractionist Lani Mitchell takes her exploration of self, romance and consciousness in a new direction. In her fifth solo show since 2009, Mitchell is inspired and driven by experiences of love, relationships and kindness. KIND explores these themes both within a micro and macro context, divulging personal feelings of heartbreak and clarity whilst questioning our respect for kindness in a post digital society.

In her characteristic approach to painting, her alchemical technique is much more subtle and sensual than previous bodies of work. The spherical forms that are the centre point for this body of work represent an idealised bubble in which a sense of wholeness, stability, comfort and security can be found.

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We experience in equal parts the ruin and opulence that come with being in love. Kindness is what you ask from your lover: to respect you and treat you with empathy and warmth. To be soft with love and gracious towards another vulnerable human. This show is an attempt to claw away and to find that humanity within each other and also in the bigger picture: there's need for everyone to be more gentle and loving towards each other. - Mitchell, 2017

We can be absorbed by the simplest moments of clarity, solace and peace within our own orbs and for fleeting moments believe in a times unstilted by complication. However, these fleeting moments of balance and wholeness are overwhelmed by our insatiable natures and inability to control acrimonious behaviours that ultimately perpetuate a cycle of both showing us and taking away our clarity. KIND’s luscious and hypnotic orbs illuminates these moments of calm and clarity found in a harmonious existence and asks us to remember the importance of empathy to ourselves and each other. In Mitchell's eyes, the absence of kindness to each other in our current state is fundamentally undoing our sense of humanity.

Words by Sophie Moshakis