James Dignan takes in some exhibitions in Dunedin.
‘‘Hotere/Jahnke/Moses’’
(Milford Gallery)
Milford Galleries Dunedin is presenting a major exhibition featuring work by three leading artists.
Ralph Hotere needs little introduction. The late artist’s works, particularly those created during his years at Port Chalmers, display a love for this place and a desire to see it protected from development, notably in his works decrying the excavation of part of Oputae hill and plans for a smelter at Aramoana. Using a minimal palette, the artist created powerful works on this theme, several of which are on display here.
Russell Moses’ works are inspired by the light on the waters of Otago Harbour. In his geometric arrays, the rippling light is captured on metallic and deeply lustred surfaces, the light changing as the viewer walks around them. The forms become the harbour, the light playing across the surface like sunlight on the lapping water.
Robert Jahnke’s works use light in an entirely different way. The artist has created a series of installations consisting of neon tubes within mirrored cases, the light reflecting into infinity in his creations. The series of items depicted in these works have a historic and spiritual connection, being the various symbols used on the flag of Māori prophet Te Kooti. The works, drawing this light from the infinite darkness, are of deep personal and spiritual significance.
“Landmark”
(Hutch)
A triumvirate of artists is also presenting work at Hutch.
While not having the track record of the three worthies at Milford, the three Dunedin School of Art alumni impress with their disparate works, all reflecting the artists’ connections with Dunedin, its environment, buildings and light.
Kipp Goodall’s chimeric images focus on the geometries of Dunedin’s buildings. Using photographic images, the artist presents softly toned screen-printed constructs, weaving shattered lattices of building from the horizontals and verticals of Dunedin’s modern architecture.
Bryn Corkery uses the opposite end of Dunedin’s urban structures, focusing his eye on the friendlier, more character-filled, but often more dilapidated structures that are in many cases being slowly lost to the Dunedin skyline. There is knowing nostalgia in Corkery’s warm ceramic homages to the Carisbrook’s terraces’ gate and local cafes, memento mori for a passing cityscape.
Chris Schmelz’s photographic images look to the bleak, empty seascapes of the city and harbour. Using old, found film stock and the unusual sepia effects created from using a coffee-based developer, the works have a strong antique feel reminiscent of pioneering photographic processes. Schmelz provides perhaps the star of the show with a strong image of the former Chick’s Hotel, At Action Park.
“Wild Blue Yonder”, Cat Fooks
(Brett McDowell Gallery)
Cat Fooks presents worlds in her miniature constructions.
Working against the usual concept of canvas within a frame, the artist starts with a picture area complete with surround which she then embellishes, before painting the whole in thick abstract patterns of colour. Rather than attempting any representational message or meaning in her works, the colour and the texture which it overlays become everything. The painting is not so much the subject of the art as the sum total of the paint used.
This in many ways subverts the normal idea of painted art in which the paint is the medium and the resulting image is the message. Here, the surface is all important. Fooks creates textures rather than pictures, and has the gift of knowing what unlikely combination of colours will best complement her wilfully dense yet playful surfaces. The evocativetitles confound, rather than clarifying, adding yet another layer of enigmatic intrigue to the works.
Each one of Fooks’ works becomes something of a stage set, as seen through a proscenium arch, with the players replaced by splashes of hue and tone. There is an over-abundance of energy and rawness in these quixotic assemblages, and they grab the eye instantly yet also reward repeated viewing.
