In The Five Obstructions exhibition at Dubbo’s Western Plains Cultural Centre, I created five works based on sets of rules or ‘obstructions’ set by five contemporary artists. The exhibition borrowed its name and concept from a Lars von Trier film, in which a filmmaker is challenged to remake his classic short film under five sets of obstructions provided by a colleague. My goal was to disrupt my fairly traditional painting practice through the influence of contemporary artists' ideas.

Cudgegong Valley – ochre tempera on ironbark

“Everything you use to create your artwork – canvas, brushes, paints etc. – has to be made by you using natural materials.” Gamilaroi multimedia artist and curator Paris Norton

This piece is a combination of historical art practices from both Indigenous Australian artists and medieval European painters. With support from the Local Aboriginal Land Council, I gathered ochre near Mudgee, and combined the ground pigment with egg yolk from backyard chickens to make an egg tempera paint.

Blind Bouquet – acrylic and modelling paste on plywood

“Create a painting without viewing the canvas until the work is finished.” Performance artist Tom Isaacs

I used modelling paste to thicken the paint so that I could feel where I had painted and let my hands be my vision. This piece was the most daunting challenge for me – it was not the most technically difficult piece, but it took away my most common tool for judgement and decision-making, loosening my control over the result.

Dinner with Mona Lisa – photo print on cotton rag paper

“Create an artwork using items and objects from your kitchen as your materials.” Mudgee installation artist Aleshia Lonsdale

I puzzled over how to make a piece with food that would also be hygienic in the gallery. Using a photo gave me full freedom to use everything in my kitchen, inspired in part by a friend’s photos of foods in various states of decay. The face is pizza dough, and I ate a lot of these ingredients on a pizza the night I finished it.

Dream Diary – mixed media on book pages

“I will call you randomly over the next week.  Make an artwork about what you are going through at the moment I call you and you must make it out of the physical context in which you happen to be in.” Photomedia artist and Cementa cofounder Alex Wisser

Alex’s phone call woke me in the morning, so I used dreams as the subject for this piece, and painted it on book pages because my bed is always surrounded by books I am reading, have read, or plan to read. I know Alex is a great believer in artmaking as a communal process, so I asked friends to describe their dreams to me.

Autumn Mirror – oil on MDF panel

“A self portrait using the colour palette of your favourite season, painted with the opposite hand and without a mirror or reference image.” Photographer and designer Gus Armstrong

Painting or drawing with the non-dominant hand gives a wobbly and imprecise character to an artist’s lines and I chose to embrace that quality for this piece. Not using a reference image and working with my left hand meant I couldn’t be drawn in by my usual desire for precision and correctness.