"I feel it's my responsibility to remind everyone through my artwork what our natural lands and oceans once were like and inspires people to preserve them for the future."  -Katherine Heald  

If you've ever admired the shapes and textures of greens in a veggie garden, been in awe of the Great Barrier Reef's colour and life or been taken back in time with a fossilized stone in a rock pool then you will have a sense of the connection to the land I have when I paint my beautiful artworks. 

The wonder of the natural world is the reason I paint.  I grew up in a rural farming community in Aotearoa, New Zealand.  We lived off the land, unpasteurised milk from my grandparents farm next door, all the fresh vegetables from our huge garden, fruit picked from the orchard, eggs, chickens, and fish from the rivers.  We preserved fruit, made jams and pickles and baked cakes.  We wanted for nothing.  In my thirties, married and with children we emigrated to Australia and fell in love with another country full of natural colours, natural wonders and life.  Both places have the most stunning natural flora and fauna of both land and sea. 

One defining moment that inspires my work was being under the spell of natures beauty at a lake in New Zealand's South Island.  There were no houses, people, traffic, shops - nothing...  just this beautiful lake surrounded by trees, untouched bushland and crystal clear water.  I felt like a discoverer, that I was the first person on earth to see this beautiful place.   Then I was startled out of my daze as tourists pulled up and I became regrettably aware of the noise and litter polluting my moment.

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                   continued below