Evan Woodruffe is ready to show off his No Straight Lines art exhibit in Hastings. Photo/Supplied
Evan Woodruffe is ready to show off his No Straight Lines art exhibit in Hastings. Photo/Supplied
Evan Woodruffe is set to wow Hastings with his new No Straight Lines exhibition at Te Whare Toi o Heretaunga.
The Auckland-based artist has spent the past six months working on an enormous new work to occupy the main wall of Hastings City Art Gallery.
Made up of six canvases,the large-scale work is nearly 3m high and 11m wide, to occupy as much of the viewer’s vision as possible so that they will almost feel like they’re inside the painting, Woodruffe said.
“This work has a beginning, middle and end, and can be read as a cycle of seasons, or life, or some similar process. It plays with the idea of illusionistic space we can move into and through, and with a work that is just about paint and what paint might do,” he said.
No Straight Lines paintings comprise a wide range of techniques, including collage, airbrush and drawing, as well as painting. His works are a riot of colour, though his newer work is more sparse in detail.
Evan Woodruffe shows his 11-metre-wide art installation to Hastings City Gallery Staff. Photo / Supplied
“Each colour has its own tonality, like a musical note. By combining certain colours, I can compose in a particular way, just as a collection of notes creates a certain piece of music.
“The colour combinations I use feel right to me, they make a painting feel right for this world. I’m trying to create a sensation,” Woodruffe said.
At the beginning of the pandemic, Woodruffe struggled with his use as an artist before coming to the conclusion that the uselessness of an artist in a practical sense was in fact the worth of the artist.
He said the worth of the artist was to “provide a laugh to crack the tension, to entertain us out of ennui, and to give us a sense of perspective against the drudging routine by showing us the long joyful kaupapa of art. This realisation drew me to more open, free spaces.”
As a result, Woodruffe is sensitive to what it means, as an artist, to bring work to Te Matau-a-Māui, while its residents are still dealing with the aftermath of Cyclone Gabrielle and said he feels privileged to do so.
“With the main work and assistance to this community done by our frontline workers, iwi and council, and welfare agencies, as an artist, I am only able to bring some colourful spaces to wander through,” Woodruffe said.
Woodruffe said when the hard mahi has been done day after day, when the head and heart are stressed and not coping, art offers a place for us to escape into.
“I bring this work to Heretaunga to offer somewhere else to be, even if just for a few precious moments.
“Art can transport us out of our everyday existence, give us some respite from our routine, remind us of the long, positive traditions we have as humans, and deliver us back to the present refreshed and better able to face another day,” he said.
To hear more about No Straight Lines, by Evan Woodruffe, there are free-entry opening celebrations at Hastings City Art Gallery on April 28, at 5.30pm.
Woodruffe will also give a talk about the work on Saturday, April 29, at 11am.
Te Whare Toi o Heretaunga – Hastings City Art Gallery is open from 10am to 4.30pm, Monday to Saturday, and from 1pm to 4pm on Sundays and is free entry.
