With the exception of studying with Kevin Oxley in 1979, Warwick received no formal art training. Influenced instead by the landscape paintings of his grandfather, hanging and stored at home, Warwick started painting, sculpture and printmaking. He is now one of Australia's foremost living landscape painters. He is a Fellow of the Royal Art Society of New South Wales, Past President of the Penrith Regional Art Gallery, home of the Lewers Bequest and was on the management committee of the Penrith Regional Art Gallery from 1989 - 1990.
"I have been painting full-time since 1978 and still can't compare the controlled studio calmness to the thrill of painting from life with all my senses activated....
“Camping under the stars in a clay pan west of Bourke New South Wales, watching a ‘total eclipse of the moon’, I was thinking about a sketch that I’d painted late that afternoon. What I attempted to capture in that painting was not the ‘things’ before me, that is the trees, the grass, the sky etc. As always, well nearly always, I was captivated by something less tangible, a quality about the scene that struck an emotional chord within. That is for me what painting is all about, trying to discover ways of expressing what I feel about the physical world around me…. How can I paint a frosty morning if I don’t have cold feet!”
Now with over sixty one man exhibitions to his name, Warwick's numerous collectors include Hawkesbury Shire Council, Austen & Butta (Portland), Mudgee Shire Council, Baulkham Hills Council, Penrith City Council, Penrith City Public Library, Ashfield Municipal Council, Sutherland Shire Council, Goulburn City Council, Neapern District Hospital, Shoalhaven Council, Fairfield City Council, Crookwell Shire Council, Telecom Australia, North Sydney Public Library as well as HRH The Prince of Wales and HRH The Duchess of Cornwall.
In 2012, 2015 and in 2018 Warwick accompanied His Royal Highness The Prince of Wales and Her Royal Highness The Duchess of Cornwall as their Official Tour Artist, during their tour of Australia. The Prince of Wales became familiar with Warwick’s work through Panter & Hall. Warwick says, “I was completely overwhelmed when I learnt of the surprising request from The Prince of Wales”. Paintings from the tour that are acquired by the Prince of Wales will become part of the Royal Collection when he ascends the throne.
Warwick describes his three whirlwind tours as being orchestrated “at a relentless pace, with military precision, planning and timing”, something that is most likely unfamiliar to an artistic temperament. Though interestingly Warwick says that as an outdoor painter, there is little difference between being driven on by an inflexible schedule or by sunsets or pending storms.
Warwick has held over sixty one man shows, ten of them at Panter & Hall since 2004.
