Gavin Hurley

Gavin is an artist renowned for portraits which employ the technique ( or at least the aesthetic) of traditional collage. Rather than seek to represent the likeness of a person, he focuses more on their character and uses the age old craft of collage and highly disciplined oil on canvas to do this.

His latest show" A - Z" will open next Wednesday and he recently took a few moments to chat with me...

What has inspired your latest show ? This current exhibition is based on the past ten years of art practice (post -art school). I decided to make a publication to accompany the show called "A-Z".The subjects almost organised themselves into this format of a slightly more grown up version of a school exercise book.

What is the recurring theme in your work?
Looking at what I would call my favourite subjects from the past ten years, its obvious there are recurring themes of boyhood fantasies of exploration, detectives and sea captains. I'm not a historian although many characters are derived from tales of colonists and there are a few homages to artists who have been inspirational such as Christian Boltanski, Sam Mitchell and Rita Angus.

What's keeping you stimulated at the moment? I'm stimulated 'right now' by seeing work being made , planning the next show and getting some time to get to the second-hand bookstores.The Internet is great but so is a dusty old book sometimes.

And how do you find being an artist in New Zealand? Being an Artist in New Zealand has been pretty good so far, I've never once considered doing anything else, washing dishes was ruining my hands.

"A - Z" will open June 10th at Anna Bibby Gallery.