Walmsley Windows: Michelle Gilmore

Michelle Gilmore is a Visual Arts student at ECU Mt Lawley, after a lifetime of dabbling with drawing, painting and textiles. Her work responds to the joyful exuberance of organic forms, and lovingly explores the rich detail in even the smallest of natural objects. Above all Gilmore is a fascinated by the endless variety of the human face and how a person’s rich inner world of memories, experience, and heritage can be revealed in their portrait. Gilmore works with a variety of media, including painting in acrylics, oils or soft pastels, drawing and printmaking.

For over forty years, Gilmore has enjoyed Subiaco’s history, its markets, its shops, its footy seasons, its green spaces, and its ever-changing face. Subiaco has been her home for over twenty years. Subi is her local. As Subiaco has changed in the last twenty years, Gilmore has seen rail yards and industrial sites transform into vibrant and expanding communities. Gilmore has found one of the joys of living in Subiaco to be the plentiful street art honouring its original heritage and history, bringing artistic representations of Subiaco’s past out into the sunlight for all to enjoy. She says “Subiaco is a place where people meet over a cup of tea, coffee or something stronger, to share life’s dramas. Not too long ago, it was also a place of industry, including the Australian Fine China Company (formerly Bristile). In this window we take a Playful Peek to these figurines from Bristile’s Wembley Ware line, engaged in their own life drama. We hope it is no more than a storm in a teacup!”