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Helen Otway
Resilience
Acrylic on canvas (diptych) framed as one with oak.
RESILIENCE is a diptych painted in response to the Northern Rivers hinterland — a landscape shaped by solitude, endurance, and quiet strength. Using soft, layered acrylics, I’ve sought to capture the slow rhythms of land and light, where forms are gently suggested rather than defined. The work reflects on the land’s capacity to withstand and regenerate — to absorb upheaval and return, altered but intact. Framed together in oak, the two panels suggest both separation and cohesion, echoing cycles of loss and repair. Resilience continues my interest in place as a container for emotion, where terrain becomes a metaphor for lived experience. It offers a contemplative space to consider how we ground ourselves amid uncertainty — and how strength can be found in what quietly endures.
Size: 84 × 54 cm
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About Helen Otway
Helen Otway is a full-time artist based in the Northern Rivers, NSW. Her practice explores the emotional and sensory experience of landscape, often blurring the line between representation and abstraction. Drawing on her Macedonian heritage and a deep connection to the Australian coastline, Helen’s work reflects themes of impermanence, memory, and belonging. Through layered acrylics and a muted, earthy palette, she evokes shifting environments and inner states. Currently studying at the Byron School of Art, Helen has exhibited widely across the region and was recently a finalist in the Lethbridge Small Works and Swell Art Prizes.
