Climate and landforms explored

The new Recent Works exhibition at the Mangawhai Artists Gallery brings back two seasoned artists, Joel Cayford and Denis Bourke, for their fourth joint exhibition.

For Cayford, his work in this year’s exhibition has been inspired by his growing concern about changes in the world’s climate and weather patterns.

“I believe these changes are substantially caused by human activity, including the burning of fossil fuels.

“I am also concerned by the lack of concerted action to change behaviours, almost turning a blind eye to what’s happening. It’s as if people are saying: a blue sky, a blue sea, and no flooding near my place means everything is okay.

“My exhibition is of photographic collages and images I’ve made in and around Mangawhai which confront and challenge what we see and what it means,” Cayford says.

Denis Bourke’s distinctive artwork reflects his fascination with landforms and terrain.

“For several decades I have been deeply involved in looking, understanding and depicting the shapes and processes of land surfaces, with a special interest in the evolution of our environment, both physically and culturally.

“My aim is to reduce and simplify the geomorphology to its essence, its underlying form which reflects its origin and is visually memorable.

“A recent development in my work is extending the idea of physical evolution and change to include the transformation of land and terrain by successive cultural land uses. Cultural patterns can overlay earlier traces of land use, and all human-driven change and modification can overlay the original geomorphology.”

This approach is reflected in Bourke’s experimentation with transparent and partially opaque paint layers.

“To achieve this palimpsest (something reused, but still bearing visible traces of its earlier form) effect I work with acrylic paint on a variety of supports, including stretched canvas, loose canvas, hardboard panels and constructed wood panel where the effect of joined planks adds texture and affirms the flat surface of the work,” Bourke says.

The Recent Works exhibition opens at the Mangawhai Artists Gallery on August 28 and runs to September 10. The gallery, located at 45 Moir Street, Mangawhai, is open daily from 10am to 3pm, and from 9am on Saturdays.