Allyson Parsons’ art is deeply informed by the coastlines and landscapes central to her Yorke Peninsula upbringing.
Story Mark Muller
the wind is sending a shimmy through the mallee leaves as Allyson Parsons and her parents Marie and Wolford (‘Wol’) laugh and shuffle on the edge of an ant bed to catch the sunlight. This grove of trees on the Port Vincent mixed farm where Allyson and younger brother Nigel were raised holds a special place in all of their hearts. It is representative of the original bushland, an inspiration for decades of landcare-led rejuvenation, and particularly of the colours and shapes that so informed Allyson in the early days of her art practice and which continue to guide her more than 40 years later.
“I grew up painting what I knew,” Allyson says. “I paint what I love and how I feel about the place I’m in, and I feel much more at home in the bush or near the sea.” This deep connection and a luminous ability to capture the feel of a place as much as the look of it underpins Allyson’s standing as one of SA’s most highly regarded and distinctive landscape artists. Her work has a combination of detail and lightness of touch that lifts it into something as elemental as it is ethereal.
This story excerpt is from Issue #168
Outback Magazine: Aug/Sep 2026
