Rosa Allison is a Pōneke-based artist primarily working amongst a painting practice. Producing beautiful oil paintings on canvas that are heavily informed by the natural world. 

Her current show an at Melanie Roger Gallery, Veriditas showcases a stunning series of paintings that continues in Allison's exploration of the natural world. The title of the show itself Veriditas, refers to a concept coined by 12th Century German Mystic, Hildegard Von Bingen. The world refers to a kind of greenness, a vitality and lifeforce that inhibits all living things. Like a sap that flows through the natural world, embodying all things with a kind of liveliness. In turn re-imagining the divine as not something that sits above nature, but rather within nature. 

The works themselves lean into this exploration of Veriditas, taking on this enriched green colour pallet that flows between works to create a visual landscape of greenness. Slipping in between abstraction and figuration, with imagery of snakes, birds, plants, mushrooms, and human bodies— both arising and slipping back into the work itself. Resulting in a luminous exhibition that pulls viewers into a space of liveliness that re-centers nature, and our ecological system.

Maya caught up with Rosa about the show as well as her overall practice.