Across the River is a chapter in Louis Rodway’s life. One that was painful, but resulted in evocative and highly-detailed art.

In the year 2000, Louis endured a major life-changing event that left him devastated and struggling to cope. He turned to painting as a therapy, hiding away in his shed drawing and painting the ferries he remembered from his childhood. For Louis, as for many Tasmanians, ferries evoke nostalgia and happy memories. He immersed himself in these cherished moments and focused on depicting ferries with historical accuracy, gradually finding a path through his grief.

Over eighteen months the series grew to a collection of more than seventy pieces, each work placed at a particular point in time, identified by ferry colour schemes or background detail.

In this exhibition, ferries, as vessels of transition and passage, symbolise Louis's journey through healing.

Louis Rodway grew up on Hobart's eastern shore and travelled across the river by ferry to school at Albuera Street Primary School every day. The sounds, sights and smells of the ferries were part of his daily routine and took root in his memory. After leaving art school Louis followed a career as a graphic artist in Hobart and on the mainland.

Once retired he started volunteering at Maritime Museum Tasmania and for the May Queen Trust, where he regularly wields a paintbrush on a full-size boat. Louis now paints landscapes and loves cartooning, a habit that began at school, and he regularly records events at the museum with a pithy cartoon.

He has said, though, that he never, ever, wants to draw a ferry again.