Hello, my name is Brenda Stead and this is my website.
I live in the beautiful town of Bridgetown, Western Australia some 256 kilometres south west of Perth. I moved here from Perth after I had resided there for 18 years. My birthplace is Melbourne, Victoria where I grew up until the age of 17. I then travelled and lived in most states of Australia at various times during my late teens and to my mid-twenties.
As an artist I am mostly self-taught and am fortunate to have some inherited ability from both artistically-inclined and talented parents. My art education extends to general art classes at secondary school but since then I have done very little in the way of formal art classes and for many years, in fact, did almost no drawing or painting at all. Over the past eight years, however, I have reconnected with my artistic interest, inspired in part from my travels and my ever present interest in history.
My art concentrates on Australian historic buildings which I find a fascinating subject as well as Australian rural landscapes, particularly the outback landscapes, all of which form part of this nation’s rich social heritage. The architecture of the old buildings and the social history that lies within them has always attracted me and I have attempted to capture their history and community through my work.
The foundation of my art is my love of drawing so I tend to draw rather than paint even though I regularly use watercolours as my preferred medium. Using watercolour in this way is both a challenge and a pleasure, allowing precision and fluidity as the need to paint shadows rather than the image itself is often required.
I also enjoy using charcoal and dry pastels which allow for both sharp and diffused effects often in the one work.
The works presented on this site are created in either watercolour, including the black and white images, charcoal or dry pastels. Many of the works may appear to be one medium when in fact they are of another, so I urge you to read the artwork descriptions for more information.
Each piece is authentic and unique in that I only work from sketches or photographs which I have taken and even when commissioned to produce specific work I attempt to adopt this method wherever possible.
I am currently working on more pieces from my last trip to Europe and also on capturing more of the local history from many locations around Western Australia.
I do hope you enjoy the website. Please feel free to email me with any comments or questions and if you wish to purchase any of the prints on offer please visit my Contact page. I would love to hear from you.