Art: Out of the ark

By T.J. McNAMARA

There is an old theatrical adage about never acting with animals or children. The same can apply to art, because much of the serious art we have seen this year is in some measure upstaged by very extensive Tooth and Claw: an A-Z of animals in art, curated by Mary Kisler at the Auckland City Gallery.

The show, which contains every animal image that could be drawn from the gallery's collections, manages two things: it celebrates a splendid collection of national importance and it serves as a thoughtful examination of how art and culture see the animal world.

The exhibition occupies the whole upper floor of the gallery and extends into the Wellesley Wing. There is even a room with a child-sized door where adults can go only if accompanied by a child, and a section devoted to Indian and Chinese art.

The show has brought out of storage former favourites such as Briton Riviere's Androcles and the Lion, painted in 1908 just five years before Bernard Shaw's play was first produced.

The lion, painted with great skill, manages to be at once fierce and pathetic. Interestingly, it is not so far away from the Disney characters that line the ramp on the same floor in a selection from the thousands of frames that go to make up an animated cartoon.

The Christmas season is given its due in the lights that flash in the interior of a vast bull made of corned beef cans by Michael Tuffery, dominating a side-room labelled The Bull Ring. This sculpture, called Povi 2001, recognises the part corned beef plays in the South Pacific diet. Boxer David Tua advertises the same product on the back of the local buses.

In contrast and relevant to Christmas is an exquisite ivory carving by an anonymous artist from 16th-century Spain. This nativity scene shows Mary, Joseph and the child in the manger with the ass and the ox, fulfilling the prophecy of Isiah that, "The ox knoweth his owner and the ass his master's crib."

Not everything in the show is Christmassy or lighthearted once you are past Barry Lett's Guard Dog that has been brought in from the cafeteria balcony. There is one of expatriate New Zealand artist Alexis Hunter's most powerful works, a large canvas called Conflicts of the Psyche, the Struggle between Instinct and Logic, where two fantastic animals interact with pale Logic grasping the bifurcated tail of the quick, violent and twitching Instinct. It is of a piece with a surreal early work by Gretchen Albrecht called Wizzo the Magician.

Power and force are also seen in the examples from the great Spanish artist Goya's Taromachia, which deals with the legendary origins of bullfighting in the same way that Alexis Hunter's work penetrates our instinctive and animalistic drives.

On a lighter note, it is a delight to see again the richly colourful tapestry by Lurcat and the Sylvan God by Arthur Wardle with a sexually ambiguous, goat-footed Pan between two leopards lying languid in a field of poppies.

Nothing could be further from this decadent image than the objective 18th-century celebration of Captain O'Kelly's famous horse Eclipse, painted by John Sartorius with an accuracy that should still appeal to the racing fraternity.

A room devoted to Victorian painting includes some wallowing pigs painted by George Morland, famous as painter and drunk, and a wonderful view of the English countryside, A Peep at the Hounds, by Myles Foster.

All this introduced European material is counterpointed with social comment in the form of Greer Twiss' wry, spirited Under False Colours which combines the flag of Empire with the introduced possum.

Similarly, the resonance of sheet metal in this country is triggered by Jeff Thompson's corrugated iron chickens which peck the floor in lively fashion. Right at the end of the show is the joy and wonder of Pat Hanly's Paradise Bird.

This exhibition serves up something for everyone, from child to scholar and sociologist. And it is visible evidence of a point gallery director Chris Saines made at the opening: "It is ours and it is free."

* Tooth and Claw: an A-Z of animals in art, Auckland City Gallery until February 18.