Traveling through outback Australia, I was struck by abandoned buildings,jumbled clusters of rusty vintage cars and the eerie, ghostly quality of the barren terrain. It seemed evocative of the lost romance of a bygone era - yet set in a desolate landscape which gave few clues to its history. I tried to convey this ethereal feeling by using impressionistic, feathery brushstrokes and blurred edges, to create a sensation of movement and an aura of mystery. Incongruous groupings and strange juxtapositions created dramatic shapes and the often blinding sunlight had a shimmering, fragmentary quality, casting pools of the blackest shadow in that dusty wilderness. I found the cars especially poignant - missing headlights, doors hanging off their hinges, the rusty patina and peeling layers of paint were reminiscent of a body's demise. As the vehicles rusted, vegetation grew up through them or they sank into the soil and appeared to be reclaimed by it. The abandoned buildings made soulful, lonely markers of time in the landscape - in time, they too will disappear.