Guided by feminist instinct and a dark sense of humour, her paintings meld romantic and escapist notions, familiar clichés and art historical references with the muddiness of the natural world. Parallel to these themes, the artist’s practice also operates as a rebuttal to seductive feelings of despair and the mysterious longing she feels between her family’s Lebanese lineage and birthplace in rural Australia. These underlying tensions lead her works from lightness into darkness, then back again, navigating ideas of the soul, reimagining power structures and centring the valorising of care.

There is a deliberate urgency to Abraham’s brushwork that wavers between brutality and tenderness, chaos and control. Gestural strokes of oil paint build forms that are at once strong and yielding. Scenes evocative of half-formed memories are conjured into existence, blurred features and negative space give way to the strange and stirring moments that shape our personal and collective experiences.

Depicting bucolic landscapes with bodies embracing each other in verdant fields or caressing animals, clad in white t-shirts and tracksuits, the artist presents a distinctly contemporary take on the romantic pastoral portrait. Blistering and brooding, Abraham relishes in the grimy nuances of life lived honestly and effusively with an energy that transcends the canvas.

Abraham holds a BA of Fine Art from RMIT, Melbourne.