Darren White

Local Contemporary Art Prize 2026 – Finalist

Image courtesy of the artist.

Darren White | Sunshine | 2025 | acrylic and oil on canvas | 91 x 122cm

The day was bright and warm, oversized and overfilled backpacks heavy, swell of the year visible but no one out. Two supportive siblings ushering the two-year-old-legs up the many stairs and into the shade of the Banksia Trees, myself distracted trying to point out how exceptional that one particular bank was – no one on it but very surf-able on the biggest and cleanest swell I had seen in years.

Pushing on, through the good track and onto the clifftop goat track to a shady spot out on the tip. Laughter and storytelling at the highest level, as though the energy from the ocean had been absorbed by the worn out little bodies. Swells hitting the blowholes making a real show, young hands now ushering sea spray skyward, looking back toward Sunshine, I wasn’t sure they’d manage to not handover the backpacks for the walk back.

Following new goat tracks we found our way back to the main path where we were greeted with a serious snake warning ahead, tears and fear sunk in for some and now all packs were on ones shoulder and the littlest child on my back – the other Sunshine now impossible to ignore.