Just Painting

Where

Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tāmaki
When

2 September 2006 - 4 February 2007

The basics of painting are its materiality, and the idea of painting, as it has been and as it is today. It is arguably a curious proposition to isolate painting from the rest of contemporary practice. Yet, perhaps more than any other discipline it has a set of conventions that artists still explore.

In this exhibition, it is possible to see a historic division between the concept of painting and its material sensibility. Nonetheless, what is attractive about aligning these works, is watching idea and object converge. Together they make obvious how entangled both material and conceptual statements are with one another.

The survival of the medium is also about the relaxation of the rules of painting. The common rules of painting, its form, media and composition, have affected and informed so many types of art making. Yet in concentrating just on painting, it is possible to better understand its influence and tenacity.

Featuring works from the Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tāmaki and Chartwell Collections. Curated by Natasha Conland.

The image shows a white gallery space with a polished wooden floor. On the left hand wall is a rectangular abstract painting of red lines squiggled around on top of a grey background, with raw canvas edges. On the right hand wall is a much smaller, olive green painting showing a small black stylised figure standing on a hill, with a bird flying above and a small sapling to the left of the figure. On the far right of the image is a large white column which intrudes into the gallery space.

Left: Anne-Marie May, Untitled 2005, 2005. Right: Diena Georgetti, The time of your miracle will soon be over, 2003. Both Chartwell Collection.

The image shows a white gallery space with a polished wooden floor. A low grey bench is placed in the centre of the space. On the left hand wall is a large landscape abstract painting depicting large shards of grey and black against a white background, clustering into two points. On the right hand wall is a large square painting depicting bright orange text on a dark grey background, which has a jarring contrast and makes the text difficult to read.

Left: Stephen Bram, Untitled, 2005. Right: Richard Grayson, Negative Space (things I don't understand) 2, 2000. Both Chartwell Collection.

The image shows a white gallery wall with a polished wooden floor. On the left hand side of the wall is a large framed square watercolour artwork showing a clustered arrangement of random objects, motifs and patterns against a murky grey background. On the right hand side three small, portrait artworks with black frames are arranged in a row, each showing a bird's silhouette above an orange gradient, a faint outline of a cat against an orange gradient, and a bird flying towards the vague outline of a person's face, away from a horse's bent leg with curled hoof and a dog gazing upwards towards it.

Left: Julian Hooper, Lookout, 2005. Right, left to right: Michael Harrison, Rock Chick, 2001-2002, Magnetism, 2002, and In Step, 2004. All Chartwell Collection.

The image shows a white gallery space with a polished wooden floor. In the centre of the room is a low black bench. On the left wall is a large landscape painting showing a multitude of different multicoloured patterns all converging on a single point in the centre of the work, giving the overall effect of a mishmash of colours, shapes and overlapping patterns. On the right back wall of the gallery is a small rectangular abstract work showing an solid orange colour with a grey cutout point at the top of the frame. On the right hand side of this back wall is a small director's clapboard with 'The United States of Anxiety' scrawled on it in white chalk. In front of these two artworks is a large rectangular, yellow brick on the floor resembling a hay bale, but in an unnatural yellow colour.

Left to right: Sara Hughes, Crash #1, 2005 - 2006. John Nixon, Orange Monochrome, 1999. John Reynolds, United States of Anxiety, 2003. Back centre: Steve Carr, Bale, 2004. All Chartwell Collection.

The image shows a white gallery space with a polished wooden floor. In the background on an opposing wall hangs the large horizontal painting described in the image preceding this one, with all multicoloured patterns converging into a single point. On the wall at the front of this image, on the left hand side, hangs a brown portrait painting designed to look like carved wood. Multiple circular patterns have been carved out of the surface of the painting, showing circular patterns with small, disembodied female figures arranged in a variety of poses in different patterns. On the right hand side of the wall is a light pink, portrait painting with a slit in the middle of it, and multiple layers of different coloured paint peeled away to expose a crevice in the work.

Left to right: Rohan Wealleans, Large carved tribal painting No. 2, 2004, and Delayed Gratification, 2001.

The image shows a white gallery space with a polished wooden floor. In the immediate foreground of the image is a large white column which cuts through the image. On the left hand side of this column is an unnaturally yellow work on the ground of the gallery, which resembles a bale of hay. On the wall above it is a director's clapboard, and on the right hand side of the column is a large vertical artwork with a series of phrases laid out on it in the manner of an optometrist's eyechart. The letters start off huge and reduce in size as the lines progress down the canvas. Next to this artwork, on the far right is a large almost square bright red work with green text on it.

Left to right: Steve Carr, Bale, 2004. John Reynolds, United States of Anxiety, 2003. David Hatcher, The simplest surrealist act (André Breton), 2002. Billy Apple, Complimentary, 1990. All Chartwell Collection.

The image shows a white gallery space with a polished wooden floor. On the far right of the image, a set of sliding glass doors lead outside. On the wall next to these doors, on the far left hand side is an artwork consisting of a square sheet of plywood board, with a metal robotic contraption hooked up on it and in the process of painting a series of dabs of bright yellow paint onto the plywood. Next to this work is an orangey-yellow artwork, consisting of a large flat sheet of reflective metal with a spirit level running down one length of the work.

Simon Ingram, Painting Assemblage No. 2, 2005, and Spirit Level Painting, 1996 - 2006. Both Chartwell Collection.

The image shows a white wall with a polished wooden floor below. On a plinth, leaning against the wall is a wrapped box of small individual paint pots in different colours, arranged in a grid pattern. On the wall next to this plinth hangs a small square painting covered in multicoloured, uniform dots which echo the pattern and shape of the paint pots in the box next to it. On the ground next to this is the light blue lid of the box, which has 'Painting By Numbers' written on it in black lettering, and the artist's name in white in the lower corner of the lid.

Damien Hirst, Painting-by-Numbers, 2001. Chartwell Collection.

The image shows a white gallery space with a polished wooden floor. On the left hand wall is a large white watercolour in a white frame. On the back wall a video is projected onto the white wall, showing the artist in a white hazmat suit painting red strokes onto a wall using his head as the brush. The reflection from this work shines on the wooden floor beneath it. Next to the projection is a tall white floor to ceiling column, and on the far right wall hangs a brown painting with a series of circular patterns carved into it.

Left to right: Julian Hooper, Lookout, 2005. Guy Benfield, Head-Painting (Asbestos Tracking in Hi Red Center 1972), 1998. Rohan Welleans, Large carved tribal painting No.2, 2004. All Chartwell Collection.