garry currin
DESCRIPTION
Various Distances Apart / 5 - 30 March 2011 / Exhibition Catalogue / Milford Galleries Dunedin / www.milfordgalleries.co.nzTRANSCRIPT
Milford Galleries Dunedin18 Dowling Street (03) 477 7727 [email protected]
5th - 30th March, 2010
www.milfordgalleries.co.nz
GARRY CURRINVarious Distances Apart
To suggest Garry Currin is a magician wielding paint is to touch lightly upon his
unrivalled capacity to combine as one the notionally disparate. We see abstraction
and (apparent) elements of photo-realism inextricably linked (Smoke and Dreaming,
2010). In other works, (Various Distances Apart I, 2008-10 and Fire at Ephesus II, 2010),
architecture and atmosphere unite the linear and organic. Currin takes us to and
then inside a world which is part-fiction, part-fact and out of this comes myth, event
and the majesty of his considerable painterly accomplishments.
He references the past – the ancient Greek city of Ephesus and the site of the
Temple of Artemis – by building sensations in his work to accompany pictorial
information. In every work there is something coming or something has happened.
He uses devices such as implied moving screens. He speaks of ruin and the travails of
civilisation with stairs leading down and in, or by inserting the grid-like superstructure
of an incomplete or destroyed building (Various Distances Apart I, 2008-10) and
leaving this open to the elements it is part of.
Currin’s narrative language is metaphysical in character with the roles of darkness
and light orchestrating how our eyes journey inside each work. He presents man’s
presence and quests as endless spiritual journeys with the landscape as touchstone.
Whether headlands, tidal flats, colonial landscape or intersecting mountains, Currin
particularises the place and locates the viewer. “Meditation on Orpheus III” is
imbued with the profound sense of being down on the beach itself. As the painting
opens up out of the veiled background islands emerge and a suggested path of
buttery light walks across the water to the viewer’s feet.
E X H I B I T I O N P R I C E L I S T
1 Fire at Ephesus I (2010) 7,000
2 Fire at Ephesus II (2010) 7,000
3 Various Distances Apart III (2010) 8,000
4 Meditation on Orpheus III (2008-10) 14,000
5 Smoke and Dreaming I (2007-10) 9,000
6 Smoke and Dreaming II (2010) 9,000
7 Various Distances Apart I (2008-10) 9,000
8 Smoke and Dreaming (2010) 3,000
All prices are NZD and include GST; Prices are current at the time of the exhibition
Garry Currin 2011 CV Milford Galleries Dunedin www.milfordgalleries.co.nz
P a g e | 1
GARRY CURRIN b. 1952, lives Warkworth
Various Distances Apart I (2008-10)
His paintings are "internal landscapes. They have a physicality about them like landscapes, but they also
have something more. People see things in them that I don't see". (1)
“Currin’s work is …made major by a scope that encompasses not only the edgy physical attributes of its
subject, but also the metaphorical implications, so that Currin actually captures the power, the darkness
and the malevolence of the very thing that he paints.” (2)
“The monochromatic and the atmospheric way forms in his paintings melt into one another exude a
sense of mystery.” (3)
“He paints as if mixing rare elixirs with rancid oils. He’s a lyricist in paint, coaxing moody landscapes out
of tangled streaks and veils of colour. He’s a quester in search of lost time, remembering things past: the
fall of shadow at a certain time of day, the spiritualised sunburst, the cloud-splitting vista at dusk.
“His paintings are phantasmagoric because they’re less actual landscapes than they are atmospheric
reconstructions… At times his paintings seem to well up from the surfaces they’re painted on like
secretions. They’re tinged with a morbid edge, a Gothic resonance verging on the melodramatic.
These are the talismans of skewed memory. Currin teases and disrupts your attempts to establish reality
of place by, say, triangulating a few landmarks. … He offers you inventions which tease and tantalise
with their elusiveness. The landmarks fluctuate, dissolving back into the paint before re-emerging as
cloud, or surf, or waterspout.” (4)
Born Wanganui, New Zealand 1952. Currin has been exhibiting his work since 1976. The time he devotes
to painting and his exhibiting programme has been gathering momentum in recent years. Currin was a
finalist in the Wallace Visa Gold Award in 1999 and a finalist in the James Wallace Awards in 1995, 1997,
1998, and in 2004 when he won the 'people's choice' vote. His work is included in various significant
collections.
1. Garry Currin, Artist Statement, 2009
2. Paul Field, ‘Seascapes capture power’, Otago Daily Times, 14 June 2001
3. Charmian Smith, ‘Shifting Changing World Inspires’, Otago Daily Times, March 27, 2003
4. David Eggleton, ‘Garry Currin The Painter as Salvage Artist’, Art New Zealand No. 94, Autumn 2000
Garry Currin 2011 CV Milford Galleries Dunedin www.milfordgalleries.co.nz
P a g e | 2
GARRY CURRIN b. 1952, lives Warkworth
SELECTED SOLO EXHIBITIONS
2011 Various Distances Apart, Milford Galleries Dunedin
2010 New Work, Whitespace, Auckland
2009 Inland, Milford Galleries Dunedin
2008 This Distance, Statements Gallery, Napier
Occupied Territory, milford galleries auckland
2006 Quotation of Dream, milford galleries auckland
Sea Narratives, milford galleries queenstown
2005 Old Language, milford galleries auckland
2003 Apertures, Milford Galleries Dunedin
Pages from the Book of Balls II, McPherson Gallery, Auckland
2001 Seacliff Narratives, Milford Galleries Dunedin
New Works, McPherson Gallery, Auckland
2000 New Works, Statements Gallery, Napier
1999 New Works, Peter Muirs Petford Gallery, Auckland
Pages from the Book of Balls, Drawings Gallery, Auckland
1997 Impressions I, Drawings Gallery, Auckland
Impressions II, Chiaroscuro Gallery, Auckland
1995 Emotional Landscape Series, Chiaroscuro Gallery, Auckland
1994 Conflict of Conscience, Chiaroscuro Gallery, Auckland
1993 Psychological Luggage, Devonport Gallery, Auckland
1980 From Dawn Till Dusk, Mollers Gallery, Auckland
1976 The Escaped Gnome, Mollers Gallery, Auckland
SELECTED GROUP EXHIBITIONS
2011 Large Works, Milford Galleries Dunedin
2010 The Earl Street Journal., milford galleries queenstown
Drawings, Annual Drawing Show, NorthArt Gallery, Auckland
Small Works, Milford Galleries Dunedin
The Royal Queenstown Easter Show, milford galleries queenstown
Mahurangi Group at Matakana
My City, Group Show, Whitespace, Auckland
Wild Swans, Rayner Brothers Gallery, Wanganui
2009 Drawings (Annual Drawing Show), NorthArt Gallery, Auckland
Masterworks, milford galleries queenstown
Private Viewing, milford galleries queenstown
2008 10 Big Paintings, NorthArt Gallery, Auckland
Occupied Territory II, A Fine Line Gallery, Matakana
2007 Five By Three, Milford Galleries Dunedin
Masterworks, milford galleries queenstown
2005 The Southern Landscape, milford galleries queenstown
This Earth: Currin, Edwards and McFarlane, milford galleries auckland
Southern Landscape Dunedin, Milford Galleries Dunedin
The Southern Landscape, milford galleries queenstown
2004 Group Show, Statements Gallery, Napier
Transit of Venus, Milford Galleries Dunedin
Transit of Venus, milford galleries queenstown
2003 Devonport Connections, Flagstaff Gallery, Auckland
Overview IS AS: ‘Landscape As Metaphor’, Milford Galleries Dunedin
2002 Meeting Point, Flagstaff Gallery, Auckland
2001 3 C’s, The Depot, Auckland
2000 Winners Show, Westshore Arts Centre, Auckland
1999 100 x 100, McPherson Gallery, Auckland
Garry Currin 2011 CV Milford Galleries Dunedin www.milfordgalleries.co.nz
P a g e | 3
Eight Devonport Artists, Statements Gallery, Napier
Beyond Beauty, Peter Muirs Petford Gallery, Auckland
1998 Milford Galleries Dunedin
Small Works Exhibition, Drawings Gallery, Auckland
Spiritual Themes in Art, St. Georges Church, Auckland
Terrestrial Forces Exhibition, Statements Gallery, Napier
1997 Westshore Exhibition, Bruce Mason Centre, Auckland
ASA Working Members Show, ASA Gallery, Auckland
Ida Eise Award Exhibition, ASA Gallery, Auckland
Art Auction Show, Outreach Gallery, Auckland
1996 Spiritual Themes Exhibition, St. Georges Church, Auckland
Copy Art Exhibition, Outreach Gallery, Auckland
Small Works Exhibition, Drawings Gallery, Auckland
Group Show, Chiaroscuro Gallery, Auckland
ASA Working Members Show, ASA Gallery, Auckland
Ida Eise Award Exhibition, ASA Gallery, Auckland
1995 Ida Eise Award Exhibition, ASA Gallery, Auckland
ASA Working Members Show, ASA Gallery, Auckland
1994 ASA Working Members Show, ASA Gallery, Auckland
Ida Eise Award Exhibition, ASA Gallery, Auckland
1993 ASA Portrait Exhibition, ASA Gallery, Auckland
1981 Group Show, Mollers Gallery, Auckland
1977 Group Show, Mollers Gallery, Auckland
AWARDS
2011 The NZ Painting and Printmaking Award, Merit Award
2010 19th Annual Wallace Awards, Finalist
2008 BMW Bonnet Artist grand prize at the BMW art awards
Wallace Award, Finalist
2007 Wallace Award, Finalist
2005 Wallace Award, Finalist
2004 Wallace Award, Finalist
Wallace Award, People’s Choice Award
2003 Cranleigh Barton Drawing Award, Finalist
2001 Cranleigh Barton Drawing Award, Finalist
2000 Wallace Award, Finalist
1999 Wallace Visa Gold Award, Finalist
1998 Wallace Award, Finalist
1997 Wallace Award, Finalist
1995 Wallace Award, Finalist
1992 Westshore Exhibition, two Merit Awards
COLLECTIONS
The Wallace Trust Collection
Private collections New Zealand, Europe and Australia
BIBLIOGRAPHY
2009 Benson, Nigel, ‘Dark Lands’, Otago Daily Times, August 28 2008
2008 John Daly-Peoples, ‘The Art Of BMW’, New Zealand Business Review, October 16 2008
2007 ‘Paintings Mesh With Poetry’, Art News, Summer 2007
2006 Howard, David, The Word Went Round, (with eight Garry Currin paintings accompanying the title
poem), Otago University Press, 2006
2004 Amery, Mark, ‘13th Wallace Awards Travelling Show, Dowse Museum’, Dominion Post, 2004
2003 Smith, Charmian, ‘Shifting Changing World Inspires’, Otago Daily Times, March 27 2003
2000 Eggleton, David, ‘Garry Currin: The Painter as Salvage Artist’, Art New Zealand, Autumn 2000