Stephen Howard
Cloud Dance, Aoraki / Mt Cook National Park
Oil on Board
600 x 1200 mm
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During a recent visit to Aoraki / Mt Cook, artist Stephen Howard was taken with a view that would alter so dramatically during changes in weather and time.
Heading out of the village, he observed this phenomena of what he describes as ‘dancing clouds’ in the rear-view mirror. Howard has created several evocative works based on his observations of South Island mountains. ‘Cloud Dance, Aoraki / Mt Cook’ features a brilliant white glimpse of Tasman Glacier amongst the earthen-toned hills, and emphasises the exquisite light and sense of movement that encompass these still giants on our landscapes.
Artist Bio
Stephen Howard is a Canterbury-based painter whose luminous landscapes explore the interplay between perception, memory, and movement. Working primarily in oil on board, Howard renders abstracted environments that offer a heightened experience of place shaped by the shifting presence of light and the slow unfolding of time.
Central to Howard’s practice is an intuitive understanding of light as both subject and medium. His distinctive use of colour and tone produces an atmospheric radiance that seems to animate the surface from within. Trees bend gently, edges shimmer, and light in motion softens forms. These gestures evoke the subtle rhythms of wind, weather, and the emotional currents of lived experience.