The Obstinate Object
City Gallery, Wellington 2012
The Press, Arts Go
Breaking Barriers:
Look out for two works by the Christchurch artist Sam Harrison in Wellingtons City Gallery’s new exhibition of contemporary New Zealand sculpture, The Obstinate Object. Harrison joins a Who’s Who of contemporary artists including Don Driver, Bill Culbert, Regan Gentry and Wayne Youle in the survey exhibition celebrating sculpture of our time. The curators, Aaron Lister and Abby Cunnane, have sought out sculptural works that elbow their way into the gallery space, refusing to fit or perform as you might expect.
Harrison’s works – an eloquent waxed plaster and steel sculpture Curled woman, 2011 and Cow, 2011, a starkly luminous animal carcass in plaster and chicken wire – have already attracted attention. He makes some of the most forlorn and anxious sculptures you will ever meet. These life- size human figures turn towards the wall, cower in the corner, rarely make eye contact. They manifest very real human fears about their fragile and exposed bodies, their place in the gallery and the world, and their relationship with each other and with the people who come to see them. “Large scale, nude figurative sculpture is not largely dismissed as overblown and traditional bound. Harrison offers a way for it to be meaningful again, by pulling these sculptures down from the pedestal and stripping away any trace of idealisation or heroism,” the catalogue notes report.
“The hints of abstraction and formalism that provide an abject beauty to these sculptures reveal that realism is not at stake here. Rather Harrison is concerned with making art a direct product of his experiences. Friends are called on as models, he works with everyday materials like concrete and plaster, and has developed a quick and physical approach to modelling and finishing his sculptures that always betrays its connection to the hand of its maker”.
Litres of fresh water, hundreds of tiny painted cardboard squares, dandling desks, metres of fibre optics, bales of hay, LED lights, countless stereo parts, 80s leather jackets and a whole lot of hot air for a giant inflatable vinyl sculpture are just some of the other mediums included in the exhibition. “I started by asking what it means to have an object-based practice now, at a time when the worth and value of objects is under constantly scrutiny. We recycle, we digitise, we download - what does all of this mean for a medium that has its basis in the making of things? And also what does this mean for audiences encountering physical objects in real space and real time?” Lister says.
The exhibition’s centrepiece is Don Driver’s 1982 installation piece Ritual, a large scale sculpture consisting of 10 44-gallon drums surmounted by doll figures with goat-skull heads, set on a dray surrounded by hay. This work acts as a potential starting point for the exhibition; visitors are invited to pick-a-path through the art works following various themes such as Curses and Charms or Ossuaries which are available on cards at the front desk. First made in 1982 for the National Art Gallery, Ritual is presented here on sculptural terms, and in relation to contemporary artists and concerns. By far the oldest work in the exhibition Lister says in many ways it feels the most contemporary, the most urgent. This is testament to Driver’s ongoing power and relevance for now, and for the future.