Penny Coss

Originally from Sydney, Perth-based artist Penny Coss has established a rich and distinctive painting style, which she continues to exhibit widely in Australia and internationally.

Through her work, Penny is mindful that focus, chaos, reverie and knowing (all aspects of the painting process) should equally become the viewers’ experience. Her practice has evolved from the tradition of abstract expressionism, taking its formal elements and melding them into a unique gestural language.

A methodical and time intensive process of preparing her canvases precedes the painting. After layering thin applications of paint, the artist sands back her surfaces to create silky smooth and absorbent grounds before engaging in lengthy periods of mixing pigments and testing swatches of colour.

With a keen sensitivity to colour and composition, Coss stains her canvases through a process of pouring layers of thinned pigment directly on to their surfaces. Coss’s staining and soaking technique is permeated with new interpretations of the Australian landscape: “my work is about those important moments of exchange within the landscape and with the possibility of being simultaneously in there and out there.”

Penny’s work is represented in numerous Australian and international collections including Itami Art Museum, Osaka, Japan, University of NSW, Artbank, Cruthers Collection of Women’s Art, The University of Western Australia, Bankwest, Derwent Collection, Geraldton Regional Art Gallery, King Edward Memorial Hospital, Kerry Stokes, Leeuwin Estate, Macquarie Bank, MLC, New South Wales College of TAFE, Royal Perth Hospital Art Collection, University of New South Wales and Wesfarmers Arts.