Meeting the Locals: Owen Hutchison
Culture | May 27, 2026By Isabelle Drake
‘It is never too late to follow your dreams.’ After interviewing and spending a short time with Mr Hutchison, this is the phrase I have come to associate with him. I am by no means saying that he has ever turned his back nor walked away from his passion for art. In fact, he has devoted almost his entire life to art in one capacity or another. But in 1995, whilst teaching at Caloundra State High School, something changed for Mr Hutchison, where he started to truly view himself as a professional artist and his art as a serious career. This eventually led Mr Hutchison to where he resides today, at his very own Bayside Gallery.
After hearing about his life, it is no surprise that he has his own gallery displaying and selling prints of his woodcuts. It almost came across as if Mr Hutchison’s entire life was leading up to him opening his very first gallery. As a child, he attended Sandgate State School, where they ‘uninspiringly’ only had grey paper and pastels to work with. However, during his time at Banyo State High School, one particular teacher changed the course of his life for the better: Miss. Watts.
She taught Mr Hutchison’s class for two years; incidentally, that first year was also the year that an arts curriculum was introduced to Queensland high schools. Miss Watts’s informed her students of artistic terminology and the values of colour, as well as acquainted them with drawing and watercolour skills.
Following school, Mr Hutchison attended teachers’ college where he continued his formal arts education for two more years, adding the history of art to his knowledge and clay modelling, lino print work, and furthered his drawing & water colour skills.
Through most of his teaching career, Mr Hutchison taught English and history. Starting in 1964, he worked at Virginia State School, followed by Humpybong State School. Artistically returned to his days of grey paper and pastels, only now he was the teacher entrusted with the year three cohorts, spending a year at each school. When, quite suddenly, at 21 years old, he was transferred to Mount Perry State School. During his first year of teaching high school, he was the sole teacher for the Year eight and nine classes. The second year, he, along with his students, all moved up a year, meaning he taught the Year eight, nine, and ten students. Whilst at Mount Perry, Mr Hutchison taught French and the watercolour skills that Miss. Watts had previously taught him, which, I am sure, felt like years ago.
What’s more, Mount Perry is where he met the Dingle family and took up wood chopping, which was the generational career of the Dingle family men. They taught him how to chop wood and everything he knows about wood textures, strengths, brittleness, etc. Knowledge he now applies to create texture in the sky, land and background of his prints, along with adding skin and hair textures of people featured in the art. During the four to five years spent learning and chopping wood with the Dingles, Mr Hutchison also competed in wood-chopping competitions and shows. But this is ultimately where the strong influence of the bushland, native flora and fauna originated and developed into the topics and subjects of his works.
It was at this stage of his life that Mr Hutchison and Mrs Hutchison got married in Brisbane and moved to England a week later. Mr Hutchison took a job at Stationers’ Company High School, where he taught literature. Together they spent two years working in England and travelling in Europe. This had a significant influence on Mr Hutchison’s artistic style whilst in Holland and Germany. The Dutch arts and German Expressionism (from the early 20th century) resonated with him personally and resulted in a change to his artistic style. With many of the prints he designed, after coming back to Australia, being black and white. Prior to returning to Australia, he picked up an interest in tennis and golf, meaning – for a time – he was less engaged with his artistic works.
When moving back to Australia two years later, in 1974, they lived in Brisbane whilst Mr Hutchison studied for his Bachelor of Arts. He took evening classes at Queensland University and obtained a double major in literature and history.
After finishing his second degree, Mr and Mrs Hutchison settled in Melany. Where Mr Hutchison spent two years building their house before helping to build and teach at Melany State School, which was one art teacher short. So, in addition to the curriculum that he normally taught, Mr Hutchison found himself volunteering to be the school’s art teacher. Whilst Melany State School was a primary school, they were known as a top school. This means they also had a Year 11 and 12 class, and the senior cohort was Mr Hutchison’s. Within the art curriculum, he taught more drawing & water colour skills and lino cut print. Unfortunately, at this time, he also attained a back injury whilst playing golf, which, combined with his role as an arts teacher, re-sparked his engagement with his own artistic endeavours.
After five years teaching at Melany State School whilst enjoying his artist pursuits, Mr Hutchison again changed schools and started teaching at Caloundra State High School whilst still living in Melany in 1995. As previously stated, his attitude towards his art changed at this point as he became far more serious about a career surrounding it. So, he was a teacher during weekdays, whilst his weekends were dedicated to his art, starting with lino cut prints. During this same year, he bought a small printing press that resided on the porch of his home and started to sell his prints.
A few years later, in 1999, Mr Hutchison bought a church that resided in Redcliffe, and it moved up to Melany. He would spend another two years fixing it up after retiring from teaching in 2000. After completely resurrecting the former church, the final building was approved by the Caloundra Council and dubbed ‘Steep Hill Studio’. The ‘Steep Hill Studio’ was Mr Hutchison’s first art gallery, and in 2004, he won his first award at the Melany show with a print called ‘. In 2009, Mr and Mrs Hutchison ended up selling their home, land, and Gallery in Melany and moved back to Mr Hutchison’s old stomping ground, Sandgate. This is where they opened ‘Bayside Gallery’.
Mr Hutchison describes his own artistic style as realism due to the challenges and creative blocks he has when trying to create abstract art. He also likes to create a narrative, particularly in relation to the human experience and conditions. The prints on the local Woolworths building in Sandgate are an example of this. The narrative surrounds the story of Sandgate throughout time. This is one of the highlights of Mr Hutchison’s artistic career, though he does print still-life works as well.
One of the artists that has had the biggest impact on Mr Hutchison’s style and work is Escher, Maurits Cornelis Escher. Escher was a Dutch graphic artist who made prints via woodcuts and lithographs. Escher’s artistic style is what had the biggest influence on Mr Hutchison whilst travelling Europe. The structural, geometric, and mathematical visual elements work together to create optical allusions when viewed. Whilst Mr Hutchison’s artwork does not induce optical illusions, there are very evident structural layers within his work that clearly reference Escher.
Aside from the Australian environment, bush, fauna, and flora being frequent subjects and topics within Mr Hutchison’s art, he also creates art that references and is inspired by his interest in literature and history. An example of this is Mr Hutchison’s prints surrounding his Bachelor of Arts degree, including: ‘Shall I Compare Thee to a Summer’s Day?’, which was inspired by the opening line of Shakespeare’s Sonnet 18. He also dedicates some of his works to specific people, including Escher, John McCrae, Pablo Picasso, and Bridget Riley. Some of the dedicated pieces are titled ‘Escher Seascape’, ‘In Flanders’ Fields the Poppies Blow’, and ‘Turbulent Times Pablo!’.
Culture also plays a big role in Mr Hutchison’s art and includes a piece inspired by Russell Crowe’s film, ‘The Water Diviner’, which is based on a true story. The print is called ‘The Spilt Tea’. A woodcut of David Bowie and a girl inspired by when David Bowie confirmed in an interview that he had cancer and talking about how he hopes his music has made the world a better place, is titled ‘The Starman Meets The Girl With Kaleidoscope Eyes’. And the last example is the Australian auteur Baz Luhrmann, with particular influences from Luhrmann’s rendition of ‘Romeo and Juliet’ within two pieces. The first being dubbed ‘Oh Baz…It’s So Wonderful’ and the second, Mr Hutchison’s personal favourite of all his works – ‘Watching Fish?’.