Quedjinup artist combines lifelong passion for creativity to encourage mindfulness

Quedjinup artist Robbie Palmer has combined her long-term passion for creativity and her work as a drug and alcohol counsellor to encourage people to be mindful and find peace. The acclaimed artist, who was based in the Pilbara for more than 20 years but now calls the Margaret River region home, has created her own studio out of a repurposed water tank which will feature in the 2024 Margaret River Region Open Studios event. Palmer said creativity was in her DNA. “I used to paint as a little girl with my Mum,” she said. “My Mum was a ceramic artist and a very creative soul. That’s I think where my art journey started — I have always just loved art.” That lifelong love of art later served as a way to honour her surrounds, and find peace while working a high-stress job. “We moved to the Pilbara about 30 years ago, and I started really seriously painting up there — just the colours of the Pilbara, the red rocks, the ochres,” she said. “Then we lived on the coast, so we had islands offshore, so that really inspired a lot of my blue and green work. “I also worked as a drug and alcohol counsellor up there for many years, and used art as a bit of a conduit, as an icebreaker as well. A lot of my mark-making is around that mindfulness. “It was a pretty stressful job so I actually brought that into therapy as well with a lot of clients that would struggle with opening up and things like that.” Palmer said art helped her clients manage their mental health with the South West providing even more inspiration in recent years. “I’m a big ocean lover hence a lot of my art’s very much around blues and greens,” she said. “I’m an abstract artist. I just find it really relaxing and adds a different element. I feel like I would love people to get peace from it, actually.” Her unique studio reflects that work. “I’ve got an old cement water tank that my husband has transformed into the most incredible studio, and it’s round,” Palmer said. “For some reason, I’m just painting round circles and things like that, with lots of depth and mark-making over the top. I just feel like I just love people to get lost in it. It’s peaceful art. “There’s something about circles, so I’m actually working in a circular tank, and I’m painting circles. I’ve never painted with straight lines or anything geometric — it’s always been soft, and it’s all about flow for me.”