Christopher Hanrahan is an artist who seems to be everywhere. Luckily he doesn’t have the same public profile as some artists and much of his involvement is behind the scenes helping out with other artist’s shows, so despite the apparent ubiquity, his name isn’t that well known. But if you like his work, it’s hard not to notice his hand in some of the better exhibitions of the last couple of years. His involvement with Gallery Wren was notable for the number of excellent shows they staged and his installation of the Turning Tricks exhibition at First Draft set it apart as a considered and beautifully staged group show. Hanrahan clearly a guy who knows something about putting three dimensional objects together, either in his own work or in arranging the furniture for his mates.
Making a step out of artist run land into a commercial gallery for the first time, his debut solo show with Esa Jaske Gallery in Chippendale – and called The Road Is Long (I wasn’t worried anyway) – is on until Saturday. Individual pieces we’ve seen didn’t really give us an idea of what we were going to see at the show. Hanrahan likes pine board, concealed lights, extension cords, cut outs, abstract objects made from crappy materials like hand molded clay or Bluetak. His titles are long, free form pieces that recall the mammoth titles of Dale Frank and his materials echo Hany Armanious. Indeed, if you were tempted to draw a through-line from the early 90s to now, Hanrahan is a logical descendant .
Christopher Hanrahan, The Road Is Long, installation view.
Hanrahan is his own artist of course, and what sets him apart is the pathos of his installation, a sense of humour that is so self deprecating it doesn’t seem like humour at all. In the Jaske show he’s taken all the things he likes and he’s arranged them in the gallery. There’s a pine board wall as you walk in with the words I wasn’t worried anyway punched out in holes. A desk-like structure has what appears to be objects made from clay [but turn out to be porcelain] arranged just so. On the wall are two signs: NOW NAU. A rectangular box structure with shelves stands on the other side of the room with more crappy kindergarten style ash trays and on the other wall, connected by an extension cord, an A-shaped frame. There’s a looped DVD playback and small items that really reminded us of bongs scattered around the floor. The DVD features Hanrahan wearing a sandwich board with NOW NAU painted on it wandering around in the wilderness. There is no music, just bird sounds and wind.
We cannot really explain the delight we felt looking at this work. A lot of contemporary art is hermetic, seemingly unconnected to the world and it often leads to a sense of frustration that its meanings and purpose are so obscure. Hanrahan’s work is undoubtedly self-contained, but it’s also fresh and open ended, allowing interpretation and narrative freedom. Seeing the artist trudge through the wilderness with his art protest [or was it a question? a demand? an advertisement?] evoked nothing less than time itself. Here is the artist, outside in the world, his sandwich board weighing him down, demanding to be read in the context of nature. When art starts to mess with the natural world, small gestures seem even smaller, literally, a voice calling out in the wilderness. Brilliant.
The show runs to Saturday and we know a lot of people will miss it and we apologise for our tardiness in getting to the show. Just as we were finishing this piece the postman dropped by an invitation to Hanrahan’s next outing. On Saturday August 13, a new work gets installed in the Sherman Art Box. Blimey, is this guy everywhere or what?
