I never thought I’d see the darling buds of May, bud, like darlings, in May (NZST). Just as February’s deluge was unseasonable, so too is the warmth of autumn thus far.
However, long lasting it shan’t be, darker days will bring frosts and winter will stomp any budding sprout back into the earth, until it feels the suns warm kiss once more. Joy can be found all year round within the walls of a gallery, and with that in mind, I bid you this month’s selection…
Trish Clark Gallery
Abstract Topologies
Amanda Gruenwald
On until 27 May
In this body of new paintings, Gruenwald continues her ongoing engagement with colour and form, influenced by our image-saturated digital landscape, physical topologies, and dialogue with painterly traditions that affirm the canvas as an object-to-be-painted. Gruenwald’s fields of colour deliver an oscillation between thickness and thinness, energy and calm, that ebbs and flows over Gruenwald’s surfaces.
Amanda Gruenwald (b. 1985) graduated from the University of Auckland’s Elam School of Fine Arts in 2012, where she was awarded the Gordon Harris Painting Prize and the Kate Edgar Charitable Trust Grant. Gruenwald was given her first public gallery exposure in 2017 at the Govett-Brewster/Len Lye Centre in Surface Affect, with Jeena Shin and Michael Zavros. In 2021, Gruenwald was commissioned to produce an entire suite of nine new paintings for the Cordis Auckland Art Collection, enabling her to transition to a full-time painting practice. Abstract Topologies is Amanda Gruenwald’s first solo exhibition since 2019.
142 Great North Road, Grey Lynn.
Find out more at trishclark.co.nz
Starkwhite
You say Sfumato, I say Sfumato
Jonny Niesche
12 May – 10 June
In You say sfumato, I say sfumato, Niesche presents a variety of works. Sfumato is considered one of the main techniques of Italian high renaissance painting. The word describes the gentle gradation and blending of one tone to another. Three works of horizontal rectangles, a motif which he has used separately, has now been melded together. These rectangular works contrast with the unity of the large scale, steel bounded works, which are executed in Niesche’s signature style.
Jonny Niesche graduated with a Master of Visual Arts, from Sydney University in 2013 and has exhibited extensively throughout Australia since, with recent acquisitions from Sydney’s Museum of Contemporary Art and Melbourne’s National Gallery of Victoria.
94 Newton Road, Eden Terrace.
Find out more at starkwhite.co.nz
Masterworks Gallery
Manufactured Typographies
Craig Mcintosh
12 May – 10 June
Manufactured Typographies considers Landscape as a human construct; a way we see and interpret the physical environment, and topography as the method though which we analyse or survey the contours of the physical terrain. The division and breakup of land into a system of human made spaces has shaped the environment and identities in Aotearoa New Zealand. Manufactured Topographies unpacks this idea in the form of a postcard. A conversation about the framing of landscape, with its subjective relationship to land.
Craig McIntosh is a jeweller/sculptor based in Dunedin, holds a Diploma in Visual Arts from the Whitirea Polytechnic, and a Master of Fine Art from Otago Polytechnic, that included exploring the history of stone carving and jewellery in Aotearoa. McIntosh’s recent work explores technologically assisted methods for fabrication and construction in stone.
71 Upper Queen Street, Newton.
Find out more at masterworksgallery.co.nz
Studio One Toi Tu
Artists on Artists
Group Show
11 May – 9 June
Artists on Artists is a group portraiture exhibition where each artist is the subject of another artist’s work, like links in a chain. Follow the artworks around the gallery space to see how each artist has created work based on their response to another artist.
Featuring established and emerging artists from Aotearoa New Zealand, including: Ritchie Adamson, Pam Brabants, Samson Dell, Kiran Morar, Delilah Te Aōrere Pārore Southon, Kieran Lowe, Vanessa Green, Hugo Van Dorsser, Billy McQueen, Belinda Griffiths, Marcel Kalma, and Lindsey Home.
238 Karangahape Road, Ponsonby.
Find out more at studioone.org.nz
