Julian Meagher’s (b. 1978, Australia) works evoke a sense of the sublime, capturing ephemeral and ever-changing moments that sit between reality and comprehension. Pared down and minimal, his oil paintings act as a mirror into the artist’s introspections and ruminations on the world and its condition. Meagher reflects the cyclical passage of time through light, nature, and portraiture, capturing the endless cycles of the built and natural worlds. Landscapes unravel as self-portraits, capturing Meagher’s feelings towards them, portraits of his family melt into fields of colour and abstract landscapes; both encapsulating his larger hopes for nature, his family and the future. Neither one nor the other, Meagher’s paintings collapse the divide between genres.
Meagher has been a finalist in the Glover Prize 2019, Archibald Portrait Prize 2014, 2015, 2018, 2021 and 2024, the Wynne Prize 2015 and the Gold Award at Rockhampton Art Gallery 2016. He has also been a finalist multiple times in the Doug Moran Portrait Prize, Salon des Refuses, Metro Art Prize, Blake Prize for Religious Art and the RBS Emerging Artist Prize. He has exhibited extensively across Australia, Asia and America, and his work is included in public collections including Artbank, Australian War Memorial, Canberra, Bega Valley Regional Gallery, St Paul’s College, Sydney University, St John’s College, Sydney University, St Vincent’s Private Hospital, Sydney, Australian Catholic Univeristy and numerous private collections.