There are artists who create from imagination. And then there are artists like Petra Meikle de Vlas, who create from memory—etched not in ink, but in sweat, dust, and salt water. Her work doesn’t begin in the studio. It begins in deserts, jungles, oceans, and in the quiet moments when most of us would turn back—but Petra, heart wide open, walks further in.
Today, she lives in the lush rainforest of Far North Queensland, a place where the natural world spills into every crack of daily life. But her journey to this point is a wild, unfiltered tapestry—one stitched together by raw courage, boundless curiosity, and a quiet refusal to live life any other way than honestly.
A Childhood of Grit and Grasses
Petra’s story begins far from the tropics, in rural Victoria, where her childhood was cradled in country air and the clang of cutlery at Meikle Cottage, her family’s art gallery café. Long before she held a paintbrush, she held herself to a standard—of work, of creativity, of doing things with purpose.
She didn’t just grow up around art—she grew up selling it. Rearranging native plants into tiny sculptures, serving tea to travelers, absorbing what it meant to put beauty into the world and ask nothing more than a genuine response in return. This wasn’t a fairytale childhood—it was real, hands-on, and formative.
And then came the spark. A high school art teacher who saw something in Petra. The kind of teacher who changes everything with a single sentence: “You’re really good at this.” That recognition became fuel. By the time she was 17, Petra wasn’t just dreaming—she was running her own gallery café, juggling the heat of a kitchen and the solitude of the canvas like she was born to balance both.
Where Curiosity Becomes Courage
But Petra’s soul was never meant to stay still. She chased the unfamiliar like it was oxygen. Her first step out of Australia was into the sensory storm of India—its colours, its contradictions, its chaos—and she didn’t just visit; she absorbed. From the crowded trains to the quiet rituals, India cracked something open in her. But that was only a prelude.
Africa came next, and Petra didn’t arrive as a tourist. She travelled alone, overland, unguarded, and fearless. She worked on a South African game reserve, witnessed the birth of a baby rhino, and stood face to face with the brutal, breathtaking truths of the natural world. In Namibia, she spent weeks reaching the remote Himba tribe, seeking more than a photo—seeking connection.
Her camera was always with her. Not for art, not then. Just to capture what she couldn’t yet explain. And yet, every image, every dusty footprint, found its way back onto her canvas years later.
Then came the collapse. Malaria took hold, and with it, the illusion of invincibility. She returned home, not defeated, but transformed. Her body needed rest. Her spirit, never.
The Landscape of the Self
After recovery, Petra kept moving. South America. Tibet. Nepal. She hiked beyond where roads ended, pushed past comfort, and found herself standing in places that seemed pulled from dreams. Places that demanded sweat, altitude, and surrender. And in each of them, she left a piece of herself—and took back something no guidebook could offer: a new way of seeing.
But perhaps the greatest discovery came when she returned to Australia and realised she couldn’t fit back into a life framed by walls and routine. She craved wilderness again. The kind that breathes, bites, and forgives nothing.
Kakadu welcomed her with crocodiles and birdsong, and she lived there by a billabong, at a wildlife sanctuary resort, immersed in the pulse of nature. And then—Cairns. Rainforest above, reef below. A convergence of elements, perfectly matching her own inner collision of chaos and calm.
Art That Comes From the Bones
For years, Petra’s art took a backseat—not because it stopped mattering, but because life was demanding its own masterpiece. Children. Sport. Movement. Wonder. But through it all, the ideas were there, simmering. Waiting.
And when they came roaring back, they came with the force of everything she had lived. Her current work dances between realism and abstraction, but always with a beating heart of truth. Textures rise from the canvas like landforms, layers built with time and intention. The ocean is her frequent muse now—but don’t mistake it for escapism. Petra’s oceans are wild, weathered, and teeming with emotion.
She doesn’t paint to impress. She paints to remember. To process. To honour.
The Restless Calm
Spend a moment in her studio and you’ll feel it—the hum of tools, the chaos of works-in-progress, the electricity of ideas mid-birth. But you’ll also sense the calm of someone who’s exactly where they’re meant to be.
Petra doesn’t separate life from art. She creates between cooking meals and collecting creek stones with her children. Her life is art. Her breath is art. Her boundaries are none.
She admits she has more ideas than time to manifest them. That she wrestles with the fever of creation, the compulsion to bring every vision to life. But this isn’t a complaint—it’s a gift. And she knows it.
From swimming with whales in Tonga to free-diving the Great Barrier Reef, Petra still throws herself into nature—not as an escape, but as a collaborator. A reminder that the world still has mysteries, and she’s still listening.
Petra Meikle de Vlas is not chasing perfection. She’s chasing truth. And in doing so, she’s painting a body of work that’s not just seen—but felt. Her art invites you to leave behind your certainty, your stillness, and step, for just a moment, into the wild.
Petra Meikle de Vlas : Website | Instagram
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