Bottled Up

Bottled Up is a series of work that explores the social preference to bottle up emotions, by reflecting on my father’s own way of being in the world, through his carafe as an object of still life.

At the end of 2023, I set out to create my first real body of work. Until then, I had produced random artworks—still lifes, self-portraits and other figures, that stood on their own or weren’t part of a bigger theme. This carafe was the only object at that time I could imagine painting so many of. It’s a homage to my dad, who was a bottled-up kind of guy, and it’s also a comment on how we bottle things up as a culture.

Seemingly a trivial object, this carafe sat in the fridge door of my childhood home holding my dad's wine. It's now in my fridge, filled with water. Dad didn't reveal much of his inner life to me or anyone else. When conversation at the dinner table went below the surface, he’d go off and do the dishes.

He was Catholic, but couldn’t explain his belief except to say that he was raised that way; he loved the Balmain Tigers; he was athletic—he had a stint playing AFL, windsurfed, golfed, played water polo, and regularly swam in the harbour baths. We reckoned he was lucky—often winning meat trays at the raffle; he was a great story teller; and was kind to animals. He also bottled up emotions and kept his thoughts to himself. He only became more direct in the evenings when he'd had a few glasses of wine and his defences relaxed. 

As my own kids got older, I realised the hard truth—that we can never truly know the entirety of someone, even those closest to us. In spite of that,  we frequently see them and ourselves in the trivial everyday objects they leave behind when they’ve gone.

Is it all Below the Surface, 2025. Acrylic and Oils on canvas. 49.5cm x 79.5cm.

These paintings culminated in one of the two largest paintings, Is it all Below the Surface, really coming to fully represent all the layers of intention in this body of work. Beyond a reconnection with my dad, and the metaphor bottles (and even alcohol) give us for protecting ourselves from our own emotions, this work is an invitation to the viewer to slow down and reflect. There’s a stillness; a presence; and clarity that’s captured with the carafe and the glass. If we quiet down enough and let the emotions happen, we can see moments of depth in the ordinary things that become a part of our lasting memory.