A graduate of TAFE, where she gained a Diploma of Visual Art, Janet not only values the technical skills she learned at CHEC but also being able to establish a network of Coffs Harbour creatives.

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Her latest exhibition, ‘Bingo’, aims to bring her experience studying at CHEC full circle while also encouraging other prospective students to study and take up careers within creative industries.

“I think artists are the witnesses of our society,” Janet told News Of The Area.

“In a world of violence against beliefs, the earth, and differences, creative expression is an excellent way to build bridges and bring awareness to current issues.

“I believe ‘more artists, less wars’.”

At the exhibition’s public opening night on Thursday, 17 October, at the CHEC library, Janet will auction her work.

“I will donate a portion of the proceeds to Lifeline as I really appreciate their involvement in our community and I will also donate to an association called Singlish which helps refugees out of trauma and improves their English through singing,” she said.

Janet’s decision to call the exhibition “Bingo” was inspired by a recent visit to her homeland.

“I have just arrived back from France where I visited numerous exhibitions and art collections.

“It was incredibly inspiring.

“As an artist you often have the complex of the imposter, even after years of hard work and many successful exhibitions.

“Bingo is like self-affirmation, it is a time for me to feel legitimate.”

Janet’s artworks can be considered decorative, but the artist says they have a deeper meaning.

Largely abstract, they have been created by mixing French pigments with pigments from Gumbaynggirr land, collected with the permission of Gumbaynggirr elders.

“By mixing pigments from different countries, I speak about the feeling that every emigrant has of being proud to raise their children in a new country and of building a new life, all while remembering the country of their childhood with nostalgia.”

The iconography of small, interconnected circles that resemble lace are distinctive of her works and are used to represent human and life connections.

The exhibition is also part of an ongoing relationship between Janet and Claire Kinder, a talented young art writer and curator, who will work with Janet on presenting the artworks.

While her creations are about, “healing, connections, the gaps, about the respect of the land, about frontiers separation, about the painful history of colonisation,” she says she makes sure not to take herself too seriously.

“Bingo is such a funny name for an exhibition. When I go bush to collect pigments and I finally find the colour I need, it is a huge bingo moment.”

“Bingo” will hang in the CHEC library for a few weeks.

Once it closes Janet will take her work to other rural and major cities within Australia and France where her work, inspired by the people, community and Gumbaynggirr land, will continue to spread messages of unity and hope.

By Andrea FERRARI