Bridie O’Brien

BRIDIE O’BRIEN — AUSTRALIAN LANDSCAPE OIL PAINTER — b. 1979. “Where your thoughts settle, your life follows.”

I am a visual artist and lifelong musician, raised on a working farm in country NSW, Australia. After graduating from the Australian Institute of Music in 1998, I pursued a music career that carried me across continents. I earned a Diploma in Entertainment Design (Illustration) in 2005 and was accepted into the National Art School the following year, though my path veered elsewhere. For the next 15 years I lived a life of sound and travel, from busking on the streets of Scotland to living on a remote Caribbean island. In 2019, I toured nationally with Icehouse, The Church, Mental As Anything, and The Sunnyboys while playing lead guitar for Do Ri Mi.

In my thirties I worked as an audio engineer at the Art Gallery of NSW, overseeing lectures that became a turning point. Walking those gallery halls reignited a calling I could no longer ignore. Since 2020 I have devoted myself to painting the natural world in oil. Working with a palette knife and bold colour, I bring landscapes to life through a language of abstract realism and contemporary impressionism. My practice is grounded in travel and time outdoors, bushwalking, snow camping, and observing the rhythms of light and land.

My work has been recognised as a finalist in major national prizes including the Paddington Art Prize, the Lethbridge Landscape Prize, and the National Capital Art Prize. I have exhibited nationally and internationally, with shows in Madrid, Austria, and Milan, and my paintings have appeared in magazines and on album covers.

My creative journey is enriched by self-directed study at some of the world’s great institutions including the Louvre in France (2019), New York’s gallery circuit (2022), Renaissance collections in Italy (2023), Portugal’s museums (2025) and all across continental China and some areas of Tibet (2025). Each has deepened my commitment to painting as a transformative force.

Every painting I create is a kind of poem, a dialogue with place, memory, and light. My aim is to reveal the deep kinship between art and the natural world, and the way both invite connection, empathy, and reflection.

After 27 years in Sydney, I have recently settled in Canberra. Surrounded by mountains and bushland, I feel at home and at peace.