Residency in Drawing, National Art School Sydney and the New South Wales National Parks and Wildlife Service, Australia

Residency in Drawing, National Art School Sydney and the New South Wales National Parks and Wildlife Service, Australia and resulting exhibition 'A mon seul desir, reveries and other series' Taylor was invited to undertake the ‘Residency in Drawing’ at the National Art School Sydney (NAS) and the NSW National Parks and Wildlife Service alongside Paul Thomas, as co-authors of Drawing (Cassell Illustrated, 2003) from October 2004 - January 2005. The studio/residence situated within the National Park at Middle Head, Sydney Harbour, afforded Taylor the opportunity to respond to this new context, and to test and explore the subject of a large series of paintings already embarked upon, developed from the six ‘La Dame et Licorne’ tapestries (c1484-1500 Musée du Moyen-Àges, Paris) through drawing. In the tapestries, the formal qualities of the carpet or ‘island’ which the central female figures occupy as a differentiated reality, along with the animated relationships of animals, people and plants, compounded an empathetic understanding of seeing the natural world afresh and paralleled Taylor’s experience in Australia of living and working in a park pervaded by nature. A series of 50 ink drawings were made as a result alongside eight charcoal self-portraits that explored the acts of scrutiny, gaze and feeling through drawing. An interim exhibition at Middle Head (December 2004) was followed by a final public exhibition of 50 drawings in 2007, in the new NAS Galleries. ‘A mon seul desir, reveries & other series’ included ‘Ghosting (Stanley and Daphne)’, a subsequent series that provided a counterpoint in the exhibition. The catalogue also included the completed paintings and essays by Nicholas Usherwood and Taylor Drawings were variously shown in ‘Seeing Something Else’ (solo exhibition during the residency); ‘40-40’; and ‘Series and Sequences’ at The Drawing Gallery, London and RWA, Bristol (drawings & paintings). The 40-40 portfolio was acquired by the V&A and ‘Predator’ is in the Collection of the National Art School Sydney. The exhibition was reviewed in the Sydney Morning Herald