Internationally-acclaimed Kiwi filmmaker Vincent Ward, who’s been in the resort this week hosting screenings of two of his iconic films, this Saturday launches an exhibition of 13 photographs he’s taken of artworks he painted on human bodies.
Entitled ‘Palimpsest/Landscapes’, the exhibition’s on at Milford Galleries’ new Gorge Rd gallery.
A palimpsest is a text with the ghost of its previous use faintly visible behind the new script.
Ward’s images, painted on professional dancers, are inspired by memories of his father, his war injuries and his work clearing rough bush hillsides to create farmland.
"I call it painting more than photography because even though I use a camera, ultimately the most important part is what I did before the camera photographs."
For four of the works, he collaborated with famous Chinese calligrapher, DongLing Wang.
Ward says he’s called on not only the knowledge he’s accumulated as a filmmaker, where he’s often explored the space between painting and film — as in, for example, his 1998 film, What Dreams May Come, starring Robin Williams — but also as an art school honours student at Canterbury University.
Following an artist’s talk at 3pm this Saturday, Ward’s also undertaking a book signing of a large-format art book, Breath, he and three colleagues produced from an earlier exhibition, at 3.45pm.
The exhibition runs till July 20.
