Art seen: May 22

Otago Daily Times

21-05-2025

"The Splendour of Ukiyo-e", various artists
Brett McDowell Gallery
The rise in appreciation for Japanese Ukiyo-e art since its time of creation is nothing short of remarkable.
Originally viewed in much the same way that we today might regard photographs on calendars or mass-produced posters, the rise of interest in asian art in Europe in the final years of the 19th century began a rise in the perceived worth of the art, to the point where it is now seen as a high-point in Japanese creative culture.
The low-art origins are a reason why good quality prints are often something of a rarity.
Brett McDowell Gallery has made an annual ritual of its exhibitions of Japanese prints, and this year's collection is a fine one, featuring several better-known artists, most notably the Utagawa school's Kunisada.
Many of the pieces are single frame images, displaying scenes in the real or imagined daily life of high society — the "floating world" which gives Ukiyo-e art its name.
The current display also includes several impressive multiple-panel pieces, perhaps the most remarkable of which is the three-piece Natural Flowers cooling off on the Sumidagawa by Nobukazu, its effectively composed night river scene aglow with rich blues and reds.
"Glass Harbour", Russell Moses
(Milford Gallery)
The rich colours of rippling water are also much to the fore in an exhibition of Russell Moses' impressionistic arrays at Milford Gallery.
Moses' art has long concentrated on the play of light on the surfaces of plants and water, creating multiple windows on the world through his grids of small geometric forms.
In his latest exhibition, the artist concentrates on the rippling waters of Otago Harbour, as seen from his Port Chalmers home.
His work has changed subtly for his previous series, incorporating here highly reflective paint rather than his former pearlescent surfaces.
Ripples are deliberately featured in this series, created by ridges in the painted surface and the resultant effect is works in which the light shimmers and shifts as the viewer moves around them.
The use of multiple colours within specific works is also a departure, allowing the pieces to suggest both the water and reflections of the land beyond.
In a couple of the works, a mirror black surface is used to suggest night waters, also a nod to the art of Moses' late friend Ralph Hotere.
The artist's deliberate association of the painted surface with the geometries of music comes to the fore in several pieces where ovals of flat white become visual chords on the surface of the waters.
"Kiingi Tuheitia Portraiture Award 2023", various artists
(Tūhura Otago Museum)
With this year's Kiingi Tuheitia Portraiture Awards drawing towards their conclusion, Tūhura Otago Museum is displaying finalists from the 2023 awards, allowing an opportunity to see the standards and styles the competition engenders.
The competition's aim is simple: Emerging Māori artists are encouraged to create works honouring their tūpuna, playing out the line of their whakapapa to their ancestors.
Despite the modern media used, this is perhaps the most traditional of Māori art subjects, the honouring of those that went before. The award is a fitting legacy for Te Kiingi.
The works are appropriately being displayed in the Tangata Whenua Gallery, where they are interspersed with the permanent displays of Māori history.
Pieces range from the purely representational to the more abstract or expressionistic; photorealistic paintings are presented alongside the symbolism of a broom and a three-panel poem.
The winning work by Stevei Houkāmau (Ngāto Porou, Te Whanau-a-Apanui) uses a necklace as an inspiration, with each of its stones a memory-trace leading back to the artist's ancestor.
Many fine and imaginative pieces are present, with highlights including paintings by Robert Pritchard-Blunt, Marie Kyle and Jody Tupara, the aforementioned poem by Trinity Thompson-Browne, an impressive carved work by Tukiri Tini, and a clever group sports photograph by Bodie Friend.
By James Dignan