New Works

From Sharne Wolff…

Besides this exhibition of their new work, artistic duo Marie Hagerty and Peter Vandermark share a house in Canberra. Though they’ve always worked separately in respective painting and sculpture practices, this show demonstrates ample connection through their use of colour, shape and shared influence. At the same it juxtaposes contrasting perspectives – with Hagerty’s curvy, overlapping, semi-abstracted images surprisingly living in harmony with Vandermark’s straight edged, geometric style.

Painting in her trademark palette of red, black and white Hagerty has experimented by occasionally pulling the red, or adding a splash of yellow or blocks of mauve and pink. Employing thin lines and shadow for compositional purposes a la Francis Bacon, Hagerty creates curvy ambiguous creatures clueing in the viewer with the appearance of knees or feet. While a number of paintings titled The Coupling point to entwined figures, her Plane Girl series provides a feminine twist on sexy advertising imagery and perhaps even alludes to the Italian futurist style.

Convinced “after 20 years of badgering” by his partner to add colour to his sculptures, it seems Vandermark has, at least this one time, taken his partners advice. Using modernist sensibilities Vandermark uses clean lines and a dash of humour to bring life to his whimsical mdf and plywood pieces.

Until May 4
Olsen Irwin Gallery, Woollahra
Pic: Marie Hagerty Plane girl 3 2014, collage on paper ?77 x 56cm
Courtesy the artist and Olsen Irwin.