April 25th, 2025Artists of the Central Highlands

with Eve Lamb

The intricate beauty of the landscape that surrounds her is a major source of inspiration for established Daylesford artist Loïque Allain. Working predominantly with linocut printmaking and weaving, her work has seen Loique awarded both national and state art prizes while her work is held in private collections around the world.

Eve: Loique your works are very beautiful and intricate. They look as though they’d be rather time consuming to create. Are they?

Loique: Yes they are. People ask me that a lot. When I’m working I can carve a large 1.5 metre by 1 metre piece in about seven working days. That is if I work constantly.

Eve: Do you particularly enjoy working large format?

Loique: Yes. I feel it gives a sense of freedom, an expansiveness. It correlates to being in the land as well because it is all encompassing and I guess working in large format gives you the opportunity to express that.

Eve: Well I’ve done a bit of research and discovered that you graduated with Honours in Printmaking from the Uni of Tasmania and completed a Bachelor of Visual Art and Design at Adelaide College of the Arts and also that you have had artist residencies in Italy at the Venice Printmaking Studio in Venice, and at Atelier Contrepoint in Paris. They sound like wonderful experiences and I’d like to know what initially drew you to art?

Loique: I guess my parents have been pretty inspirational. They work in the arts and always encouraged me. My dad managed some Indigenous arts centres at Aurukun and in the Tiwi Islands north of Darwin.

And my mum would run a lot of workshops with the women, painting and weaving. I spent some time with my mum and dad in those communities and I guess I was really inspired by the work coming out of those communities, particularly the large format work.

I thought going to art school was a really good opportunity. Also, when I was younger my parents worked in the scenic art department of film and theatre. I’ve always been around art and art from different cultures.

Eve: Have you ever worked in any other sectors?

Loique: Yes. My husband, Chris Dilworth, and I have our own wine business as well. My husband is a winemaker. We moved here because we’ve always loved the wine from this region. Chris was a winemaker with Owen Latta at Eastern Peake.

We started making wine there in 2017 and ‘21 was our last vintage. Now we’re running our own wine business. We’ve made a winery at Leonards Hill at the old Dwyers Mill. We moved there in November last year.

Eve: Well wine and art go together very nicely. What inspires you most in creating your art works Loique?

Loique: For the last couple of years I’ve been focusing on Cornish Hill in Daylesford, also Jubliee Lake, Lake Daylesford and Wombat Hill. I’ve been inspired by the local landscape that I visit on a daily basis.

Eve: Do you have any special events or exhibitions on the horizon?

Loique: Yes. My friend, Clare O’Flynn and I share a studio space at 5 Howe Street in Daylesford. It’s the Wombat Hill Print Studio.

We’ve been here for just over a year and we’ve wanted to have an exhibition here for a while.  I’ve made a body of work over the last couple of years and the exhibition will open from 5.30pm-8pm on Friday, May 16. David Frazer from Castlemaine  will open it and then it will run for that weekend through to Sunday.

Eve: And you also run monthly workshops don’t you?

Loique: Yes it’s an introduction to hand printing linocuts. We start with an A5 size lino and we handprint onto Japanese paper. It’s beautiful. It’s made of mulberry wood. It’s quite strong. But it’s fine enough to handprint onto. Quite ethereal looking.

Photo & Video: Kyle Barnes