IT took a near-death experience for David Giles to follow his heart and become an artist.
Dragged under by the iron-cold grip of a rip off a remote beach south of Walpole, panic was replaced by a euphoric sense of mysticism—and the proverbial white light.
“I stopped being aware of my body, of being in the ocean, but had an awareness of being [that] became mystical…almost a science fiction type of experience.”
Regret mixed with the descending sense of peace as death seemed inevitable—including, oddly, whether his eco-tourist clients on the beach would be traumastised by their guide drowning, or even find their way back to civilisation without him.
“I thought ‘it isn’t fair I wasn’t given any notice of this. I haven’t seen my kids grow up or done what I want to do’.”
“What do you want to do?” he recalls his inner-most psyche asking his drowning self. The answer? ”Be an artist”.
A life-long interest in art to that point had resulted in buying paints, but never finishing a canvas.
“I was waiting for the right time to be an artist,” he says wryly.
Giles isn’t sure how he managed to drift closer to shore, where his clients dragged him to the beach and saved his life.
But back home in Albany one of the first things he did was set about closing his tourism business and enrolled in art school.
Having nearly died he no longer fears death, “which frees you to live”.
Twenty years on, the now-Fremantle-based artist is the winner of 20 awards and has 40 solo exhibitions to his name along with showings in New York, Paris, Singapore, Sydney and Melbourne.
Born in Singapore, Giles grew up in the UK before heading Down Under for “an adventure” with his wife and daughters, aged six months and two years.
With his wife scoring a job in finance in Albany, and Australian residency, Giles became a house husband and farmer.
“I went from inner-city living in Leeds to farming,” he laughs.
These days instead of rounding up cows he’s rounding up artists with art classes and the chance for students to exhibit at his High Street, Fremantle premises.
He proudly boasts that his gallery sells original local art at affordable prices, which sees works almost walking off the walls.
Many students are established artists who come along for the chance to share and grow their skills.
“It’s become a peer studio,” Giles says.
His own art adorns the walls, much of it still influenced by his brush with death.
“[It’s] informed by a yearning to represent a sense of the mystical and sublime. For me this is the purpose of art.
“I hope those who view [it] can catch a glimpse of a deeper mystical reality.”
A couple of months ago Giles opened a second gallery, Studio Eleven, on Captain’s Lane, near the Round House.
by JENNY D’ANGER
David Giles Art Gallery
49B High Street, Fremantle
0416 079 204