KEY POINTS:
It may be some consolation for a dismal winter that there are some fine, rich exhibitions in the city this week - although the show of three works by the American artist Tony Oursler at the Jensen Gallery may console nobody. Though it is exceptionally powerful, it is deeply disquieting.
Oursler is an artist who can be encountered internationally in many museums and substantial shows of contemporary art. His work is much more suited to museums and public shows because it is disturbing to an extent that would hardly be tolerable in a domestic setting.
The artist creates his work by projecting a moving image on to a three-dimensional sculptural form. The image is usually a head or at least a mouth, distorted but very real. A spoken soundtrack, which is only partly intelligible, usually laments, pleads and groans in a way that is always plangent and very moving,
In previous shows the forms have usually been a head shape and these catch the eye and move the heart as they lie on the floor pleading for attention. In this show the major work is a large piece with many oval shapes. On each shape an eye continually shifts and blinks. One large mouth set vertically appears more or less to speak the groaning text and one small mouth reflects the movement of its counterpart.
When the work is seen at night and lit from the front, the shape casts a huge irregular shadow as the community of eyes roll suspiciously in all directions.
The effect is striking in itself but it also suggests a worried, even neurotic community, watching but never trusting their spokesman. Considering it as relevant to politics in the US is only one avenue of response.
The other two works also break from previous patterns. One is a splash of black on a wall with an aperture through which a distorted mouth speaks or a twisted eye peers out. The skin on the face is black and simian. It shows contemporary life as a zoo: the face on display is obviously a prisoner of circumstance.
Upstairs is a new departure - work with no projected faces. It simply consists of a light bulb and some packing cases. It goes far beyond British artist Martin Creed's notorious room where the light simply went on and off. Here the light is choreographed with a spoken text issuing from unseen speakers about enlightenment and obscurity, revelation and disguise. It is a compelling, uncomfortable thing.
By contrast there is plenty of cheerfulness and bounce in the work of Sara Hughes at the Gow Langsford Gallery, now moved to Lorne St. Typically her work has consisted of complicated, brightly coloured, angular shapes spectacularly zooming diagonally across the space of the painting. In this show almost all the movement is circular. Even if the painting is square in outline, the shapes within it spin into a vortex.
It is this sense of spin, of plunging into obscurity, that gives the best of the work a special relevance. The forms used in these works are numbers and the way the colourful mass of them swirls away suggests how the numbers on which our whole world depends are continually in movement through electronic media. They are also lively pieces of decoration.
Hughes' decorative invention is never-failing. A gigantic work called Firing Line is made up of paper tags dipped in red paint. Each tag has a letter on it and they are arranged in circles. It makes a splendid "jeu d'esprit" but does not have the metaphorical qualities of the smaller works.
The exhibition as a whole is, as always with Hughes, evidence of a highly individual manner and an authority of approach that makes these vivid paintings sing.
A different kind of virtuosity but equally pleasant to the mind and spirit is the work of Justin Boroughs at the John Leech Gallery. He has made his name with views around Auckland harbour drawn with great accuracy and flooded with light.
One motif he has painted many times are the boatsheds at the bottom of Ngapipi Rd, Orakei. Cezanne had his Mt St Victoire; Boroughs has his sheds. There are two variations of the scene in this show: one light and cheerful, the other darker and shadowy. The larger, brighter version, Boatsheds with Silver Spray, Kailua and Aldwyn, is notable for the three launches moored in front of the sheds. Not only do they sit convincingly on the water, but they have individual character.
There is a fine sweep in a painting of Bean Rock and another of Karekare and, in a departure from the Auckland scene, a painting of Karaka Bay in Wellington which suggests why the Japanese find reason to venerate offshore rocks of impressive size and shape. The only quibble is the occasional use in some of the paintings of a rather chemical green that breaks the tonal harmony.
This is traditional art done with care and great craftsmanship allied to knowledge and deep regard for place. It breaks no new ground, explores no philosophical depth but hits its mark with consistent accuracy.
For gallery listings, see www.nzherald.co.nz/arts
