Painter, Potter, Printmaker

6 March - 28 May 2020

In the Small Gallery, Sarah Guppy, Sally Simons and Lauren Drescher present a collection of new works.

Sarah Guppy

"...My brothers home in Tanger looks down to a terraced two acres garden, across the Mediterranean to Spain. I have travelled there many times and been inspired by ceramic objects, the mystery of a walled city with its cultural colour and daily rhythms.  Henry Mattise, Mary Fedden and Francis Hodgkins were among many others who were captivated by the light which washes everything in a blue white.    Historically artists have often used ceramics as sculptural form in landscapes, a kind of invitation through a still life, window or doorway. Composition my teacher  Maggi Hambling (at Morley College  London) said was more than half the painting. 

My love of clay developed early in my life, as my mother had a ceramic shop in Parnell in the mid 1970’s. School holidays were spent in a red Hillman Imp trolling around Coromandel collecting pots that filled the tiny car. It was not until my return to New Zealand after nearly 20 years in the UK that I turned my hand to clay.   

During my time in UK I was taught the art of gilding by Christina Leder from Vienna. Learning a technic as ancient as Egypt has given me a skill, and also a love of surface, detail and subtly. 

In 2010 I was Artist in Residence at Owhanake Barn, Waiheke. During the residency I gilded maps of the island in 22K gold, symbolic of the richness I found in the beauty of the island. 

www.sarahguppy.co.nz

“When artists give form to revelation, their art can advance, deepen and potentially transform the consciousness of their community.” ~ Alex Grey

Lauren Drescher 

Lauren divides her time between Auckland and the French Pyrenees. As a traveling artist she has adapted her printmaking practice to fit into a suitcase. A long time traveller and collector of ephemera, she frequents flea markets worldwide in search of old paper such as antique ledgers, children’s notebooks rich with old penmanship and forgotten envelopes from dusty attics. The artist posted 20 kilos of antique French paper to NZ for these works. The paper fragments each with a history lend an insight into the quotidian. Paper produced pre 1950 is acid free. Much of the material is over 100 years old. Each element is carefully selected for its markings, colour, or texture.  

Using printmaking as a starting point, watercolour, pen and ink or collage are employed to illuminate the drawings. The artists hand is present in each piece, no two works are alike. In this exhibition there are selected works from different series lending insight into different printmaking techniques including; relief prints, dry point etchings and chine-collé.

Chine-collé is a technique in which an additional layer of paper is applied to the etching plate before it is passed through the press, incorporating the collage into the final print. The imagery is palimpsest. 

Drescher trained at Cooper Union School of Art in New York City. She arrived in Auckland in the mid 90’s from Indonesia where she was working as a midwife for an NGO. After a decade spent working in Women’s Health, she came full circle to complete a printmaking degree at Central Saint Martins in London. 

Lauren has exhibited widely in the UK, USA, France, India, South Korea and NZ. This is her first exhibition in Auckland. For further information please visit;

ldrescher.com 

instagram : lauren.drescher

Sally Simons

Sally Simons studied Visual Communication at Wellington Polytechnic, graduating in 1980. Initially working as an illustrator in Wellington she relocated to London for a time and worked at Animus Films. Her illustraions have been used by various New Zealand businesses, publishers and government departments including DOC, Landcorp, NZ Post (Christmas stamps 1990 and 1998). She has illustrated books and fabric designs.

In 1990 Sally lived high on a hill overlooking the beautiful Whangaroa Harbour in Northland. Immersed in the spectacular landscape of the Far North, with its beautiful coastlines and bush, she began painting in oils and has been exhibiting her paintings since 1997. Since then she has never looked back, despite a mid-life change of direction when she studied and obtained a nursing degree and was a paediatric nurse at Starship hospital for a time.  However her deep love of the natural world and sense of connection to the land, rivers and sea drew her back to full time painting.

She draws inspiration from and paints the beauty of the New Zealand coastland with its native flora, birds and bush, headlands and estuaries, views across water with New Zealand’s unique silvery light.

‘I’m interested in rare wildness and beauty and our sense of the places we inhabit or perceive, living in proximity to the natural world.  The spaces in between are as meaningful as the objects or places themselves.’

Sally has been painting and exhibiting landscapes and still life for over 20 years and now divides her life between Auckland and Wales. She exhibits in both NZ and in the UK (Ironbridge Fine Arts Gallery, Shropshire and Crickhowell Community Gallery, Wales.)

https://sallysimons.wixsite.com/sallysimons