Steve
Gary Abkin
- Sitter: Steve Parish
- Medium: Oil and enamel on plywood
- Dimensions: 82 x 125 cm
- Representation: AK Bellinger Gallery
About the artist
Gary Akbin is an American Australian artist living in Brisbane, whose highly-charged sense of humanity’s illogical behaviour defines his aesthetic. He studied painting at the California Institute of the Arts and then the San Francisco Art Institute. In 2003 he relocated to Queensland. He has exhibited throughout the US and Australia. He has exhibited in Sacramento, California, at Pamela Skinner Gallery and more recently at the Ipswich Art Gallery. Abkin has also been represented in numerous local and international prizes. With absurd familiarity and subversive honesty, Abkin is a prolific contemporary storyteller.
About the sitter
Steve Parish is a photographer, writer and teacher who’s work is known around the world. For 50 years, he has been working at bringing the beauty of nature closer to people. Steve pioneered underwater nature photography in the late ’60s and now manages the largest and most comprehensive privately owned photographic library in the nation. Steve first started publishing in dive magazines at the age of 18. Since then, he has shared his work with through thousands of publications, talks, exhibitions, and public events. Today, he Lives in the Blackall Range on the Sunshine Coast Hinterland. From his digital studio, he and his family run Steve Parish – Nature Connect, an internet portal that offers publishing, library services, fine art decor, photographic education Australia-wide. Abkin painted this portrait after visiting Parish at his hinterland home. The portrait conveys his creative voice as a story teller and teacher.
