Gellibrand River Gallery

Deb Gartland is a self-taught traditional and contemporary fine art photographer, who goes around with a head full of high falutin’ ideas!

In 2019 Deb won the inaugural (acquisitive) Conceptual Photography Award - with a photo encaustic and mixed media piece. She won both overall winner and best entry by an Australian Photographic Society member.

Inspiration for Deb comes from the world around her, and she is particularly drawn to beaches, cliffs and the ocean. She thrives on the colours, textures and patterns in her life.

Grandiose images and worlds fill Deb's nightmares and dreamscapes, and she likes to create visually confronting images with her photography. She is not a purist, and from very early in her career has been pushing herself to break the rules and challenge boundaries.

As an encaustic (hot wax painting!) artist, Deb incorporates her photography, mixed media and sculptural components in her encaustic paintings - thus creating pieces that are unique, textural and highly tactile. Having attended an encaustic workshop around 2017, Deb has never looked back from working with this medium.

Deb's encaustic workshops require no experience and she runs them regularly as an intimate day with between one and four participants. Her encaustic workshops are popular with novice and experienced artists alike.