Painting
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Georgia Spain
No one tells you how to weather a storm
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Kate Kurucz
Eventual Horizon
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Hugo Michell Gallery are proud to partner with Bird in Hand Winery for this opening event. Please join us in celebrating the launch of these two exhibitions!
Congratulations to Richard Lewer, winner of the 2015 Albany Art Prize! This prestigious national painting prize is an acquisitive prize for $25,000, including a studio residency. The winning work, Untitled from the Mostly Sunny series, was presented by Hugo Michell Gallery during Melbourne Art Fair 2014.
Lewer’s statement about the piece:
Last year the Western Australian government implemented a shark culling program off the swimming beaches of Perth and the South West coastline following the deaths of 7 people. Being a surfer, I was spooked by the fatal attacks, but like many locals, was also concerned about the efficacy of the government’s fear-driven policy and the brutality of the baited drum lines used to capture the sharks.
My work explores extremes and conflict; the shark culling program attracted local, national and international attention, and public demonstrations were held around the country; as a social realist I joined the 6000-strong protest at Cottesloe Beach to document the fervent debate in my local community.
The work will be exhibited alongside the other finalists in the regional city of Albany from September 4 – October 11 2015.
See Albany Art Prize website for more details.
Image: Richard Lewer, Untitled, 2014, from Mostly Sunny, oil on epoxy-coated steel, 100 x 100 cm.
"William Mackinnon’s landscape paintings portray the Australian terrain and the road laid upon it with ebullience, wonder, whispers—and even terror. The artist makes paintings you can almost inhabit. His visions of the rural parcels around Melbourne capture the vastness of his domain in manners both terrestrial and emotional. But movement and displacement abound in his pictures too, conveying temporal urgency with stunning effect.
In day-lit, long-range views of wooded cliffs along the sea, and racy snapshots from nocturnal car rides wrought with dazzling, painterly invention and compositional risk, Mackinnon suggests the notion that the extraordinary abounds in the mundane and that the search for a perfect wave is not unlike the struggle to make a perfect work of art."
An extract hot off the press from The Speed of Light and Dark: The paintings of William Mackinnon
by Alex Weinstein in The Surfer's Journal
Congratulations to Ildiko Kovacs on winning the 2015 Bulgari Art Award!
Ildiko is the fourth winner of the Bulgari Art Award, one of the most prestigious art awards in Australia.
The $80,000 award includes the acquisition of one of Ildiko's works by the Art Gallery of New South Wales, and a $30,000 residency in Italy.
The acquired work, Onda, is also the first acquisition of Ildiko's work by the Art Gallery of New South Wales.
"Onda" is the Italian word for "wave"; Ildiko said of the work: "For me it’s a really important part of being at Bundeena, I love the ocean...The ocean has always been my lifeline...a lot of my work I guess is the rhythm of the wave, it’s my response to nature."
The Art Gallery of New South Wales' Head Curator Wayne Tunnicliffe said: "I have long admired the gestural brilliance [of Ildiko's work]..."Onda...exemplifies the artist's innate understanding of colour and line."
Onda is currently on display at the Art Gallery of New South Wales.
Head on over to our Facebook to check out photos from the award Gala!
Image: Ildiko Kovacs, Onda, 2015, oil on plywood, 180 x 365 cm, collection of the Art Gallery of New South Wales.
William’s landscape paintings sit at the intersection between reality and imagination and convey a powerful sense of place and mood. William showed his latest body of work 'Crossroads' at Hugo Michell Gallery from 12 February to 21 March, hot off his sell-out show at Melbourne Art Fair 2014. In 2014 he was also a finalist in the Basil Sellers Prize and shortlisted for the Alice Prize. Born in Melbourne in 1978, he had his first show at the age of 19. He has exhibited widely nationally, and internationally in London, Washington DC, Hong Kong, Shanghai and Beijing. His work is held in the collections of Ian Potter Museum, Melbourne University, State Library of Victoria, Artbank, Griffith University, Holmsesglenn, Macquarie Bank Collections, RACV and Stonnington Council Collections, as well as various private collections in Australia and overseas.
We are thrilled to add this talented young artist to our great group of artists!