Biography - Alison Annesley, M.C.A. (Hons)

Born to missionary parents, my early childhood years were spent in China, and concluded with three years as a Japanese prisoner of war. Those years have had a profound influence on many areas of my life, including my Art.

Since childhood I have drawn and painted and as I matured, I have sought ways to gain knowledge and achieve excellence. During my family’s ten -year stay in the United States I was able to study privately under accomplished Artists and at Tyler School of Art in Philadelphia. Later in life I studied at James Cook University North Queensland, Australia, graduating with my Masters of Creative Arts (Hon’s). I very much enjoyed the exposure, the discipline and the opportunity to pursue and research the area of “Dynamic Symmetry.” While I have worked in Oils, and Acrylic, Watercolour and Chinese Brush and Inkstone are my passion.

As an Art Instructor I have taught for the Queensland Barrier Reef Institute of TAFE in the evening program for eighteen years, taught privately for a further twenty years, and conducted many watercolour workshops around the State. I have had a number of solo exhibitions, won a number of local awards as well as awards in Brisbane and in Pennsylvania U.S.A.

Whilst techniques in the various mediums differ, the principals or fundamentals are the same, and it is these that I like to emphasise in my teaching. My classes are comprised of a balance between the necessary techniques for the work at hand, and how to use Art principles.