T.J. McNamara: Local colour ignored by going global

Mladen Bizumic 's Global Truths #50 the spectator becomes part of the subject. Photo / Glenn Jeffrey

Mladen Bizumic had a work in the foyer of the fine exhibition In Shifting Light at the New Gallery recently. It was a portfolio work that incorporated a video and several photographs. It helped to establish him as one of the brightest young talents in New Zealand. The work showed, in diagrams, Little Barrier Island transported to the lagoon in Venice. It suggested that since we imposed aspects of European landscape here, why should not the reverse be attempted.

Since then, Mladen Bizumic has transported himself to Europe and is living in Berlin. Some of the work he has been doing makes up his exhibition of colour photographs at the Sue Crockford Gallery.

There is no reference to where or when the images were made. The artist calls them Global Truths, emphasising they could be anywhere. He also adds in the title, vs Local Reflections. He makes a point that the glass over the photographs will inevitably reflect the viewer so the spectator becomes part of the subject.

One consequence is that the pictures are very general. They could have been taken by any one of the thousands of highly competent art photographers around the world. There is certainly a big stack of such photographers in Germany as witnessed by the two exhibitions sponsored by the Goethe Society that were part of the Auckland Festival.

There are some undeniably fine images in the exhibition, notably an angled shot of rows of shipping containers set up as two storeys of dwellings or offices and the tangle of pipes that service them. Another one is of a fairground swing with tiny figures in flight on its ropes seen against an immensity of sky.

These are, in their own way, brilliant but the work in the New Gallery, especially in the diagrammatic photographs, had an originality and a philosophic depth that is lacking here. By going global Bizumic has lost the piquancy of thought that comes from reference to a particular situation.

Work coming in from overseas is also the material of a very colourful exhibition at the Gow Langsford Gallery. Like the work of most artists these days this is a portfolio exhibition where the works on the walls are accompanied by a spectacular video.

The paintings, called Refractions, by Tim Maguire are all untitled, made from photographs of the intricacy of the growth of trees. Underlying is a photo that has been digitally manipulated to produce strong effects of light and lift the colour to a very bright key. The image has been worked over with paint, sometimes to strengthen lights on the branches. At other times an action painting style gives the paintings irregular splashes of colour.

The bright pigments make exceptionally intense colour that makes each image separate from any particular place or thing. The paintings just exist in their own right. They are spectacular decoration.

The best of the works give the branches of trees a twisting energy. One work in particular has a heavy trunk through the centre which gives it a really brooding presence.

The vividness of the work extends to digital prints which are brightly, even violently, enhanced with colour that ripples across them. The ripples actually move in the video that has a room to itself. Although the starting point is obviously flowing water, the footage has been so digitally manipulated that the screen becomes a continually changing abstraction. It is a delight to watch and the absolute antithesis of the kind of social comment that is the mainstay of art videos.

Digital effects are a major part of an unusual exhibition called Mystery Plays by Link Choi at the Satellite Gallery. All the works are religious paintings of a sort.

The artist takes biblical stories and gives them a modern flourish. His original sketches are scanned into a computer, then he uses a digital programme to enhance their intensity.

Some of the works have traditional subjects and are shown with quotations from the King James Bible that set the scene. Works like The Annunciation have no winged angel making the announcement. Instead, Mary in a headscarf is faced by a little, kindly, bearded man. This is very witty and works well though the figure above her with a halo of guns is a step too far.

Modern references abound. Christ at the Pillar is a hooded figure and crocodile clips of electric torture are a frieze behind him. The most melodramatic images are Judith where the beheaded Holofernes is shown with his neck neatly sliced and Delilah where the dreadlocks of Samson that hold his strength are matched by the abundant dark locks of the betrayer.

Samson is pretty skinny though. A more muscular Samson might have been more dramatic.

Such a display of religious subjects, albeit with a modern twist, is rare but these works have enough drama to make his work more than an oddity.

Oddity has always been part of the work of Sam Mitchell whose exhibition Touched is at the Anna Bibby Gallery. This show makes no changes stylistically except that the work has grown in size and confidence.

The figures painted on Perspex are large and colourful and their heads are filled with thoughts done as tattoo images. The sex and the neuroses are still there as well as the mockery of parents and pretension.

The imagery is sometimes very funny as when a woman dreams of Prince Charming which is a winged penis with a Prince Albert piercing. Nearby is Puccini with a bristling moustache. One work has written on it, "Stop me if U heard this one before." It could be a motto for the show but the wit bears repetition.

At the galleries

What: Global Truths vs Local Reflections, by Mladen Bizumic
Where and when: Sue Crockford, Endeans Building, 2 Queen St, to April 25
TJ says: A bright talent making strong images but marking time and not achieving the depth of thought apparent earlier.

What: Refractions, by Tim Maguire
Where and when: Gow Langsford Gallery, 26 Lorne St, to May 1
TJ says: Big, confident, decorative images using all the resources of digital enhancement and modern pigments with a video stirred in.

What: Mystery Plays, by Link Choi
Where and when: Satellite Gallery, cnr St Benedict St, ends today
TJ says: Melodramatic religious paintings scanned, then digitally manipulated to suit a modern context and sensibility.

What: Touched, by Sam Mitchell
Where and when: Anna Bibby Gallery, 226 Jervois Rd, to May 3
TJ says: Spectacular work by Sam Mitchell with her startling heads on Perspex sometimes extending to figures filled with witty images of tattoo and neurotic preoccupations that would have delighted Freud.