Layers and light form a cerebral vision

There is a potpourri of visual sensations in this week's art exhibitions. The greatest variety is assembled at the New Gallery where a selection of Auckland Art Gallery's acquisitions over the last few years is on show.

The single most spectacular work has already been illustrated in the news section of the Herald - a gigantic, shiny sculpture of an exhausted ballerina by Michael Parekowhai. It conveys the general sensation of exhaustion after elegant effort but it is also a landscape in itself, a range of rounded hills and valleys. Its finish, materials and colour are very modern.

Many of the acquisitions tend to be far more cerebral. At the top of the stairs you are confronted by one of Julian Dashper's much-discussed drum kits. Not a big one to celebrate the work of Colin McCahon or a smaller one to celebrate lesser artists but this time to comment on art history. The drum kit has a big splash of yellow paint on it in reference to Jackson Pollock's method of splashing paint in his art. The paint was in a little pot, the artist gave it a kick and the paint splashed on the drums. It makes a lively, witty gesture but the effect is not helped by a little video of the occasion where the artist is surrounded by giggling acolytes.

Such an elitist addition to the collection is balanced by John Reynolds' painting Last Evening on Earth where rectangles of colour in movement reflect every kind of mood of the sky. Rohan Wealleans uses all his skill in layering and carving the substance of paint to make his highly original Snow White in a Snow Storm. Even the maligned L. Budd of the et al collective has a really fine work in Unity of Appearance where the sides of an awning speak of original brightness becoming faded on the outside with the working of time and weather.

Photography plays its part in Allan McDonald's memorable series of 30 thrift shops which continues to explore the fringes of society.

One whole room is given to a particularly fine group of 10 photographs by Bill Henson from Australia. These large images use light magnificently, in one example illuminating a patch of road that leads to darkness like all the lonely roads that ever were. Then there are photos that seem to catch the essence of adolescence in striking studies that owe a great deal to the Baroque painter Caravaggio and yet are very modern. The waywardness of adolescence is conveyed by details such as a lovely girl with five piercings in her ear and her companion practising sword swallowing which seems touchingly ambitious of a career with a circus.

An entertaining exhibition full of visual life is the semi-retrospective of portraits by Gavin Hurley at Anna Bibby Gallery. Whether these are collages or paintings they are flat, clear and precise with considerable carrying power. The images are just short of stereotypes. The touch of individuality is often conveyed by beards or hairstyle and the context by a plain indication of dress or background.

It is really remarkable how much life Hurley is able to convey with his beards, which are usually given to heroic characters. The unsuccessful or diffident only have little tentative moustaches. For women, a bouffant hair-do does it all.

One of the liveliest of the collages is The Little Buccaneer who has a van Dyke beard and a jacket of appropriately patterned paper. It is delightful how a hint of armour reveals the milieu of Captain John Smith while the sheer size of his Victorian beard gives a bandit glamour to Captain Moonlight and, dare one say, to Charles Heaphy.

This is the most comprehensive and consistently successful exhibition Hurley has shown in Auckland.

Less consistency but a similar sense of development can be found in the work of Neil Miller at Artis Gallery. His sculpture has always been light-hearted and quirky but in the past he has constructed his work from steel. Here he has moved to casting in bronze. Each piece is quite small but all of them incorporate in their combination of abstract elements of rods and spheres a small, thoughtful sensation.

Typically a work called Icarus suggests falling as the legendary Icarus fell from the sky. A work like Growth is a series of forms that reaches upward. The sensations can be subtle as in Paradise Lost, where halfway up the work there is a sudden dislocation of forms. The stems that emerge from this dislocated structure, although they are abstract, are like gestures of dismay.

It is not all despair, however. A series of small works which balance on pieces of marble suggest acrobatic feats and yet the meaning is not closed. A charming little work called Bunny is at once a lively gymnast whose legs also suggest the pricked up ears of a startled rabbit. It is this element of wit that gives these deft sculptures their surprise, tension and individuality.

There are times in the show when the absence of lateral features rob the works of tension and energy but a number of works with multiple sensations will intrigue those who have a taste for small bronzes.

The work of Emma McLellan at the Lane Gallery offers two distinct sensations within each image. The well-known rubric, "the sleep of reason produces monsters", applies here. The artist fears experimentation with genetics may produce sheep with wings, birds with a rat's tail and similar chimeras. Paradoxically, the oddities she places in the middle of her work are hallowed as if in a dream with the appearance of woodcuts illustrating some old book of animals. More paradoxically, the backgrounds of the works are charming patterns from old wallpapers and materials.

The two sensations are held together by an intricate technique that involves silk screen printing as well as painting and computer process. The effect is immediate charm but with an acid edge, typically and most effectively in Ex Familia Muris II and Pullus Morbus II.

For gallery listings, see www.nzherald.co.nz/go/artlistings

AT THE GALLERIES

What: For Keeps: Sampling Recent Acquisitions
Where and when: New Gallery/Auckland Art Gallery, to July 11
TJ says: A welcome look at works bought by or gifted to the gallery in the last three years with plenty of material for discussion.

What: A-Z, by Gavin Hurley
Where and when: Anna Bibby Gallery, 226 Jervois Rd, to July 5
TJ says: A witty show where highly stylised portraits convey just enough information to set character and time yet achieve considerable presence.

What: I'm Never Going Back to My Old School, by Neil Miller
Where and when: Artis Gallery, 280 Parnell Rd, to July 12
TJ says: Cast bronze is a new departure for this sculptor who formerly worked in steel. His small bronzes have simple forms but can be very lively.

What: Silk Purse from a Sow's Ear, by Emma McLellan
Where and when: Lane Gallery, 33 Victoria St, to July 4
TJ says: Images that combine two forms of design: aberrations from GE alongside dreams of pleasant patterns of the past.