Rod Moss: Moon Havoc

Rod Moss has lived in Alice Springs since 1984, writing, painting, drawing and carving tables with Australiana motifs.

“Australia’s relationship with its First Peoples, following the pattern of European countries worldwide, has been contentious since colonisation. How this relationship was unfolding in Central Australia occupied my attention from the get go. My creative work concerning this relationship has ineluctably attracted attention in town and far beyond.

The drawings, re-describing country close to home, have strong affiliation with the figurative social commentary. It is after all the same country that I’ve walked, hunted and camped in with the families staffing the paintings. The drawings are uniformly grey. While they celebrate with loving detail specific places the tone intends to alert the viewer that our environment is not as pristine and healthy as it appears.

I’m fully enlivened when drawing: physically, intellectually, emotionally intense, though calm. My excitement and satisfaction derives from bringing the look and feel of something into existence that creates the illusion of a parallel world.

Graphite has been a favoured medium from the beginning. My first Melbourne solo show in 1978 was comprised of drawings, close to the eye, of gardens housing surreal objects. Hyperreal or surreal elements persist in these meditations on rocks. But Buffel grass, which provides verdancy to the Centre’s soils and rhythm to many drawings, isn’t surreal in any sense as the text of the accompanying catalogue makes clear.” Rod Moss, 2025