Louise McRae’s exhibition takes its name from an ancient, mythical people said to have inhabited a land of overwhelming, perpetual darkness. There is a ritualistic, almost atavistic quality to her process - the splitting and painting, the burning and rebuilding - which calls to mind age-old philosophies around purification and renewal.
McRae talks about destruction and reconstruction and finding meaning in the process of reconciling these exploded parts. But the axe and the flame do not solely destroy; they also open up the process to chance and allow the natural characteristics of the wood to sing. The heat of a fire gives the wood a unique texture and a velvet-black surface which is a perfect counterpoint to areas of rich colour or iridescent foil. When split, shards of wood break along the curvature of their grain, forming the contours that bring movement to the finished pieces.
The finished works paradoxically speak of human impact, labour and repetition, but also of the forces of nature and patterns of growth in the natural world.
preview the exhibition here
Please join us at the preview from 5pm on 27 June 2017
at grey, 37 Scanlan St, Grey Lynn, Auckland
We are delighted to have received Annie Sandano’s pieces for Seed Gallery’s KidsCan project, a series titled Colour Harmony which she has produced during a stint in Rome.
Link here to view and purchase online
Sandano has spent the better part of 2016 on an art-immersion tour of Europe, broadening her horizons with a series of artist talks, seminars and practical workshops; and visits to museums, studios and galleries. From June to July, Sandano took part in an oil painting workshop in Florence, expanding on her time spent at the Australian Print Workshop earlier this year by adding another set of skills and techniques to her repertoire. She also enjoyed a visit to Edition Copenhagen printmaking studio, a lithographic print studio in the city which invites artists to produce editions using their expertise and facilities. Below: images taken during Annie's painting workshop in Florence.
Annie counts Milan, London, Venice, Copenhagen, Barcelona, Madrid, Bologna and Lisbon among the centres she has visited… And the tour continues; in January 2017 she will commence a month-long residency at a print workshop outside of Barcelona. We wish Annie well and welcome the exciting developments within her practice.
30 artists, 300 artworks at $80 each
CLICK HERE to link to all available works
preview: 5pm 19 November at NorthArt
open: 10am-7pm 20 November & 10am-4pm 21 November
online sales from: Sunday 20 November
location: NorthArt, opposite the Library on Ernie Mays Street / College Road, Northcote, Auckland
Every year, Seed Gallery invites 30 artists to respond to a specified template. This year we have chosen an ambiguous wooden shape which could represent a petal, a teardrop, a map pointer or a speech bubble, among many other things. The selected artists have each been given 10 locally produced templates and the latitude to create whatever they wish.
As the charity partner for this exhibition, KidsCan will receive $5 from the sale of every piece.
We are pleased to present the shape for our upcoming Christmas exhibition and to announce KidsCan as our charity partner, to receive $5 from the sale of every piece. KidsCan exists to meet the physical and nutritional needs of disadvantaged Kiwi kids so they can engage in their education and have a better chance of reaching their potential in life and we are delighted to be able to support them.
Every year, Seed Gallery invites 30 artists to respond to a specified template; past iterations have included wooden balls, crosses, hoops and stars. This year we have chosen an ambiguous wooden shape which could represent a petal, a teardrop, a map pointer or a speech bubble, among many other things. The selected artists have each been given 10 locally produced templates and the latitude to create whatever they wish and we await their creations with much anticipation!
The exhibition will be held at NorthArt, opposite the Library on Ernie Mays Street, Northcote, Auckland, with ample free parking available in the Northcote Shopping centre carpark on the corner of College Road and Ernie Mays Street. Guests can look forward to enjoying a selection of Invivo wines at the preview on Saturday 19 November - be there at 5pm to celebrate with us.
For further information, please email gallery@seedgallery.co.nz
opening: Saturday 19 November at 5pm
exhibition: 19 - 21 November 2016
open 10am – 4pm daily
at NorthArt
Norman King Square
Ernie Mays Street, Northcote, Auckland
www.seedgallery.co.nz
Instagram @seedgallerynz
Seed is pleased to present a new collection of weird and wonderful ceramic figurines by Mark Rayner. Mark’s works are informed by fantasy, hyperbole and often the absurd or abject. He transgresses social norms and combines beauty and vulgarity in careful measure in subversive creations that never fail to amuse.
Mark is a true Renaissance man and his interests are diverse, as his many and varied occupations attest.
Mark and his brother Paul run Rayner Brothers Gallery in Whanganui, where they show their own work along with guest artists.
Mark is also a playwright; his play, 'The Pin-up Boys', is due to be staged by the Ellerslie Theatrical Society from 11 - 19 August. Additionally, having trained as a garden designer, Mark writes a monthly DIY column for Kiwi Gardener magazine and creates regular art and DIY projects for Resene's website.
On top of all this, Mark works part-time as a postie for NZ Post and cares tirelessly for his three cats Matilda (17), Mandy (5) and Ziggy (5)!
Seed is pleased to introduce Louise McRae’s most recent works: a series of small and intricate assemblage paintings. In one sense these works are rooted in the experience of looking itself, but they also explore memory and the cyclical nature of matter. Brightly painted fragments of timber jostle for space on a substrate that can't quite contain them. Memories of the past lives of McRae's materials are held within unruly grids, and we see an interplay between what is natural and constructed.
Necessity is the mother of invention and so McRae’s scale has adapted to what can be constructed on a tabletop while she builds a new studio in Pakiri. With an empty paddock as a starting point, the sky really is the limit and the project has taken on grander proportions than McRae ever expected. Inspired by the urban lofts of New York, she fell in love with steel windows and was thrilled when as sole bidder on a trademe auction she was able to purchase a set for $51.
On collecting the windows she discovered that not only had they come from the studio of Paul Dibble 40 years ago, but that the vendor was Warren Viscoe, a sculptor whose work she has admired for many years. So in keeping with McRae’s use of objects and materials with a history of their own, here she acquired some beautiful windows with excellent provenance, met one of her heroes and enjoyed a tour of his home and work.
Seed is delighted to present Annie Sandano’s newest collection of prints; the result of three intensive weeks working at The Australian Print Workshop in Melbourne during March this year. Here Sandano enjoyed open access to an incredible range of facilities and shared a working space with some of Australia’s top printmakers.
She developed a vibrant new series of unique and distinct acetate plate prints. In some works she applied flat colour with rollers, while in others she manipulated colour with brushes or thinned it down to create a translucency akin to oil paint. Finishing touches were added to the works on Sandano’s return to NZ.
These works signal exciting developments and evolutions within Sandano’s practice. Among them are a series of portraits with a stylised head topped with flowers and the “Geometric” works, which see the geometric forms of her paintings reimagined within their own spaces, free of other compositional elements and fields of colour. We also see the influence of the Andy Warhol/Ai Weiwei exhibition Sandano viewed at Melbourne’s NGV and her trip to Japan immediately after her Melbourne residency in her “Sakura” or Cherry Blossom works.
Originally from Brazil and now based in Whitianga, Sandano’s varied cultural experiences have always informed her printmaking methods and her choice of imagery - it is exciting to see further developments as Sandano returns to her studio brimming with ideas and inspiration from a rich new source.
