Artworks that do double duty: Elliot Collins, Kathryn Stevens & John Pusateri

What a difference a day makes. Last week when I sat down to write this email newsletter it felt like those of us in Tāmaki Makaurau Auckland hadn't seen the sun in weeks. Right now, we've had two consecutive days of sunshine, blue skies, and almost zero rainfall. A welcome relief for all of us. 

The stark contrast between one day to the next makes me think of the inherent dualities that exist: wet/dry. Dark/light. Cold/hot. Natural/human made. The thing is, you can't have one without the other. Put another way: wet is the absence of dryness. Dark, the absence of light. It is also possible for one thing to be two things, or more, at the same time. Perhaps this is what makes the thing genuinely interesting, intriguing, and worthy of a second look.

If we think about this from the perspective of art, a painting doesn't just have to be a painting. Indeed, a painter doesn't, and very often isn't, just a painter or just a sculptor. They might be both at the same time, to varying degrees. And then of course there are artists who draw from disciplines outside the traditions of painting or sculpting, taking a multi-disciplinary approach.

Poetry, engineering, mathematics, research science, archeology, wood craft for example. All of these fields, with their own traditions and their own parameters serve as the inspiration for contemporary art. The result is artworks that elicit not only visual delight but also mental and cognitive stimulation. These works get you thinking. They ask you to contemplate concepts and ideas that are beyond the art object itself.

Elliot Collins

Elliot Collins is a painter, photographer, poet, philosopher, and self proclaimed introvert. Being all of these at once, Collin's work is imbued with great pathos and humility. It is work that seeks to capture and hold time. The way he achieves this is not simply with exceptional painterly skill, colour theory or image composition, but through the presence of the written word. His poetry becomes not an adjunct to the painting, but an integral part of it. Painting and words form a perfectly symbiotic relationship so that one cannot function without the other.

Talking to me about the work he has inBread and Butter,a group show at The Grey Place in Grey Lynn which opens on Tuesday 19th, Collins said:

"It's a strangely important work for me to have made. I'll explain more later, but it's reaching all my personal goals in terms of telling a story, playing with words, and even the structure of a poem on a brown oil paint surface that references the literal earth as well as Rembrandt's brown shadows and seasonal time."

We will explain more later, but in the mean time, explore Elliot Collins on Artfull and head along to the show. 

Kathryn Stevens

Tāmaki Makaurau based Kathryn Stevens is a painter whose abstract work is informed by her formative education as an engineer. Her elegant, seemingly simple abstract painting begins with the germ of a structural idea which Stevens works out in three dimensions. A methodical initial approach sees Stevens cutting, folding and forming physical structures from sheets of clear plastic that inhabit space. These maquette are then translated into luminous paintings that interrogate what it is to think about and occupy space on a two dimensional surface. 

It is not all serious however. Her methodical approach evolves into spontaneous play - perhaps influenced by her love of jazz which she shares with her jazz musician husband - and it's often in these moments where a plastic sheet breaks after having been bent, folded or twisted one too many times that creative breakthroughs happen.

Go inside Stevens' light filled Queen Street studio and learn more about her approach to art making in our exclusive Inside the Studio video.

John Pusateri

Growing up in Pittsburg, Pennsylvania, John Pusateri spent his childhood getting lost amidst the specimens and artefacts at the Carnegie Museum of Natural History. It's not surprising that the dormant, interconnected stories across time and space that artefacts hold is a thread that runs through every facet of Pusateri's practice. 

Every time I have the pleasure of spending time with John, I come away having learned something fascinating about the natural world around me. Not necessarily a big, huge mind blowing thing, but an essential insight into the way all things are interconnected. Case and point: in 2007, Pusateri discovered a mite, Oplitis Pusaterii (named after him) as an accidental part of a research project on native bush regeneration he did with a friend.

As an artist, this research and documentation led approach finds expression in his exquisitely detailed drawings and lithographic prints which consistently explore the convergence of history, science, and the human condition. From birds, to bats, or the humble moth, Pusateri's subjects always come back to the intricacies and fundamental essence of all things in the natural world around us.

Learn more about what inspires and motivates John, and get a glimpse inside the Auckland Print Studio in our exclusive Inside the Studio video.