Jahman Davine is an Australian visual artist working with natural materials. He uses earth pigments—ochre, coal, clay, and soil—gathered during his travels to create layered abstract paintings that invite quiet reflection. His process roots painting in nature.
Born in a commune in Nimbin, New South Wales, Jahman spent much of his childhood travelling with his mother. He lived for long periods in India, where he stayed in ashrams and was ordained as a Tibetan Buddhist monk.
After finishing high school, he trained as an actor and theatre director at the National Drama School in Melbourne before moving to Berlin, where he spent nearly a decade directing experimental performances—from underground squats to concert halls.
Returning to Australia, Jahman turned from performance to painting, travel, and spiritual inquiry. Over two years on the east coast and through Tasmania, he began collecting the earth pigments that define his work today. This journey led to his first solo exhibition, Silent Hymns, at Brunswick Street Gallery in 2023.
In 2024, he returned to India and Southeast Asia to study yoga, Hinduism, and Buddhism, then spent several months painting in his mother’s garden in the foothills of the French Alps. That body of work became the basis for his second solo exhibition, Seen Unseen, completed from his studio overlooking the ocean in Wye River, on the Great Ocean Road.
Seen Unseen was presented at No Vacancy Gallery in 2025.
Process
Each pigment begins as earth — ochre, clay, coal, or soil — collected from cliffs, riverbeds, and roadsides across Australia. In the studio, the raw material is sifted, filtered, and dried until it becomes fine as dust.
A few drops of linseed oil are added, and the pigment is ground by hand on a glass slab until the two become one body — soft, luminous, and alive.
