Changing landscape of digital art

Images of Wairarapa woven from wild ideas and digital wizardry will open eyes at a Carterton exhibition to a region never before seen.
The Edge of Time exhibition at Katz Gallery from A.J. Hunter, Wairarapa digital artist and Ucol Wairarapa advanced 3D graphics and animation lecturer, portrays scenes from photographs compiled over several years from a variety of locations in and around Wairarapa and Wellington including Lake Ferry, Castlepoint and the Wellington Harbour.
"The images show what the regions would have looked like before men moved into the area, and what they may look like in the future. As well as no visible human effects on the landscape, including introduced plants; the photos show a geologically different landscape."
Hunter said the exhibition, his first solo show, provides glimpses of an imagined time before some of the massive upheavals that have occurred in Wairarapa and Wellington since 1460, and flashes forward to digitised views of the region in 2200AD.
Hunter said he has also included images showing Wairarapa landscapes in the style of local painter Jane Sinclair, whom he lists as an influence in his works.
Hunter said that although the photos are eerily familiar "nothing that you see in the exhibition is real".
"That doesn't mean that most of these views aren't real from past or future perspectives in history.
"The world of 2200AD will be a much-altered place, full of ruins, genetically-engineered weeds and the surviving descendants of trees and animals which have been fast-forwarded through a billion years of evolution by human development.
"It will look much the same as it always has from a distance," he said.
"If you were at the right time and right place with a camera, this is what you would see. As a digital artist, I can take an idealised image from my head, and make it into reality."
Hunter caused a stir of controversy and national media publicity with a digital calendar he created for the Green Party this year and the Carterton exhibition "continues and expands on the environmental themes central to that project".
Hunter specialises in computer graphics and has a long history in television and motion picture special F/X that provide a technical background for the exhibition, he said.
"The exhibition blends elements of science fiction, time travel, traditional New Zealand landscape photography, art nouveau, indigenous Maori culture and environmental and political commentary."
Hunter counts among his influences the works of international luminaries including Roger Dean, Patrick Woodroffe, HR Giger, Dali, Magritte and MC Escher. As well as from Sinclair, he draws inspiration from Katz manager and pastel artist Carol Banner.
n The Edge of Time runs at Katz Gallery until November 3 in Belvedere Road in Carterton; Fridays to Sundays from 10am to 3pm.