Artist's back turned on traditional icons

Painting by Dick Frizzell.
Painting by Dick Frizzell.
His paintings have names like The Dancing Chicken. He's designed bed linen and painted the Antarctic. He's quirky and comic but there's a book out portraying him as a "serious artiste''.  He's Dick Frizzell. Marjorie Cook reports.

It is not easy to tease out of Dick Frizzell whether he thinks he deserves the description of a "senior and esteemed practitioner of the arts'', given him recently by Wanaka's Gallery Thirty Three.

"I guess that's an honour. But it's not something you dwell on,'' he mumbled in a recent interview.

Then he perked up: "It's great. I can't believe it."

And he chuckled at the blatant flattery: "I sometimes do think this is the pay-off for all the despair.''

Frizzell is one of seven stars the small commercial gallery has identified as the "crème de la crème'' of modern New Zealand art and is exhibiting until May 1.

He was so happy with the company he was invited to join (having taught two and studied with a third), he supplied four new paintings especially for Wanaka.

It was worth making "a bit of an effort'', he said.

"When [gallery manager] Lydia Baxendell approached me with this scheme of hers, I was impressed with her enterprise to pull that unusual line-up together. I thought it sounded like fun.''

In his art, Frizzell frequently plays with icons, so we talk about his view of the "iconic'' Wanaka landscape. Would he rather paint the mountain view from Roys Bay or the scene on the

Shooters Bar balcony? Would he paint the high view from Mt Iron or Puzzling World below it?  "I think the whole of Central Otago is an icon. Without a doubt,'' Frizzell says.

"How to capture that? I would deal with it quite confrontationally.''

Of course he would. Frizzell did a big tour of the South Island. Afterwards, he put on a show of landscapes in Auckland. Critics panned them. People loved them.

He loved "just the whole South Island''.

But it's no surprise when presented with Wanaka mountain or bar balcony, he takes the balcony. He likes the suggestion he could turn his back on the view. He notes how easy it is to forget to look behind.

"I'm always looking for the personal angle in the ordinary. I like to go a little further with it.  That's my modus operandi... That's a nice analogy, turning my back,'' he said.

Puzzling World also gets his thumbs-up. He likes wonky buildings against a mountain backdrop.  "Art is all about ideas,'' he said.

We talk about the word "icon'' itself, often despised, especially when it is applied to things unworthy of such status.

Frizzell happily shoulders some blame for the pepper-pot use of icon. Throughout his long career, he had only the best intentions when reworking or subverting iconic images.

"It has become a bit of a thing. I am associated with it. I was responsible for quite a bit of it; all the Kiwiana stuff. But that's OK. I don't mind taking the blame for that,'' he said.

Frizzell will be in Central Otago later this year for a Cure Kids charity bash in Queenstown.  Frizzell is now painting for an exhibition in Queenstown based on signs he saw on the West Coast for eggs, horse manure and fishing.

Sadly, it is unlikely he will be able to find time to come to Wanaka and paint our icons.

"That might be a bridge too far this time. [Cure Kids] has a fantastic programme in Queenstown and I will be lucky to get out of Queenstown,'' he said.

"Crème'' features works by Frizzell, Don Binney, Don Driver, Glenda Randerson, Michael Smither, Philip Trusttum and Michel Tuffery, at Gallery Thirty Three, in Wanaka, until May 1.

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