Trees for the Wood

David Aspden was an entirely self-taught artist who began his career as an apprentice painter and sign writer. Aspden migrated to Australia in 1949, settling first in Sydney where he established himself as one of the country’s finest painters of colour.  

Trees for the Wood is typical of his lively style of painting and demonstrates the artist’s fine sense of colour and light, and his interest in representing aspects of the natural world. Aspden’s technique employs loose, unrestrained painterly gestures to develop an earthy and tonal union of shapes and colours on a patterned plane. Towards the end of his career, Aspden developed this technique in a limited edition of ceramics. 

 In 1969, the artist was quoted saying,

‘My painting is first an event or process, rather than a mere object. This process later involves the viewer in a structure of colour forces.’

Aspden represented Australia at the IX Biennale in Sao Paolo, Brazil in 1971 and received many awards during his career, including the Wynne Prize in 1995. Trees for the Wood was restored by ArtLab in 2003 with funds raised by Adelaide Festival Centre Foundation.