This exhibition features the work of established Canberra artist/printmaker Jo Hollier in the main gallery space and new works by emerging artist Ellen Bennett in the smaller back gallery. While the artists’ exhibition has a single title, there are effectively two exhibitions on display, and the artists are united familially rather than aesthetically.

Hollier’s work will be familiar to many Canberra viewers. In this exhibition she continues her explorations of the avian, floral and insect life that surrounds her west Belconnen studio that have been such a fecund source for her aesthetic expression over a number of years.

The “collection” aspect of the title is perhaps a reference to the accumulations of leaves, seeds, feathers, etc, that randomly populate her studio and as constant reminders of her immediate and wider environment. The “obsession” alludes to both her collecting habits and to her ongoing fascination with the rich possibilities innate in her use of print-making as her premier medium. In Collection and Obsession she traverses a number of print media including etching, monotypes, woodblock collage, and collagraphs.

In Banksia Collection I and Banksia Collection II, the banksias of the title are both subject and method in that actual banksia leaves are integral to her creative processes. The leaves in these works are spread out neatly across the surface of the paper. The presentation has a quasi-scientific flavour reminiscent of 18th and 19th century botanical prints. The latter were made for identification purposes.

Hollier’s “experiments” are rather more invested in her attraction to the living plant and are underscored with a quiet acknowledgment of the fragility of life that threatens plant life. The artist’s skill as a printmaker is beautifully exemplified in these lovingly depicted and singularly delineated specimens.

Another work with similarly 18th-19th century overtones is Beetlemania. Uniting a monotype with a woodblock collage Hollier creates a layered visual confection that speaks simultaneously of the objectivity of the scientific with the subjectivity of the creative. The central image with its multiple images of beetles is sourced from a scientific publication. It sits atop a signature Hollier image of a variety of leaves laid out on a beautifully textured blue ground. Three images of beetles dominate the lower foreground of the work, their orange bodies strident against the black ground.

The artist’s predilection for native (and other) plants is given splendidly diverse expression in the exhibition. For her the possibilities for aesthetic exploration in the world of plants is endless. She exploits these with an engaging freshness in each of her iterations of her floral world.

In Hakea, a softly gentle character is given to the overall presentation of the plant. Hollier’s palette is essentially modulated reds highlighted with the pale spectral blue of an overlaid leaf. The texture of the paper’s surface is integral to the overall aesthetic of this work and is exemplary of the artist’s consummate understanding of the elision of subject, material and method in the successful pictorial resolution of a work of art.

Similar resolution can be seen in Maidenhair, and more dramatically in Young and local. In the latter (essentially a triptych) Hollier capitalises on her printmaking skills to present a floral tableau that moves the viewer from left to right across the image(s). The central group is dramatically presented, with deep tones of red, blue and gold predominating. The lateral images offer a softer tonal appearance that cues the viewer into the deeper spatial configuration of the central panel.

A group of four bird studies ( New England Honeyeater, Eastern Spinebill I, Eastern Spinebill II, and Wattlebird ) illustrates another facet of the artist’s rich expressive depths. In each of these there is an opulent density in the palette, for me allusive of Indian or Persian miniatures. The tonal density highlights the avian inhabitants and imbues a marvellously lush resonance in each of these beautiful works.

Within the exhibition Hollier demonstrates not only her considerable technical skills but also that within the range and variety of her subject matter, she is able to adapt these skills to provide each image with a singular identity that speaks of her highly-developed imaginative and aesthetic vocabulary the depth of her expressive vision.

While Jo Hollier is concerned with our natural environment, her sister Ellen Bennett’s concerns embrace the domestic world. Her specific interest lies with the drinking vessel or bowl and her visual celebration of this has resulted in a joyfully whimsical display.

Apart from the four paper clay moulded vessels, Bennett uses print-making techniques, principally here the collagraph. She displays her “vessels” singly or in groups, and in one instance (Bowled over) with 40 examples. The latter work is the largest in the exhibition (150 centimetres by 60 centimetres) and its overall blue and white palette is a exclamatory reference to the ubiquity of blue and white in the history of porcelain (and especially Chinese porcelain). The compendium of bowls is impressive and the visual éclat provided by this work (and its accompanying works – All in the detail I and All in the detail II) is especially impressive in the gallery space.

Bennett had a period earlier in her life when she studied ceramics. It is also interesting to note that she was married to the late Alan Peascod, one of the most significant artists in the history of Australian ceramics. While her work as exemplified here is very much her own there are nevertheless subtle allusions to the textured surfaces of Peascod’s Islamic-inspired pots; allusions redolent of understanding and assimilation of another artist rather than mere imitation.

This is a celebratory exhibition but also one that deserves careful attention. The nuanced surfaces, textural variety and decorative embellishments that give singularity to each of Bennett’s “vessels” invite close inspection. They may express simple pleasures but the pleasures of the quotidian are given special significance in this delightful exhibition.