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Kirstin Carlin has been announced as the 2017 Major Molly Morpeth Canaday Award winner for painting and drawing, among 13 award recipients announced on Friday, 27 January 2017. Carlin’s painting Through the Trees (Thirteen) was described by judge Felicity Milburn as having "a sheer ‘look at me’ audacity."
Presented by Arts Whakatāne in association with Whakatāne Museum and Arts, the 2017 Molly Morpeth Canaday Award for Painting and Drawing is exhibited across all three galleries at Te Kōputu a te whanga a Toi — The Whakatāne Library and Exhibition Centre.
This year the award attracted 430 entries from artists throughout the country. The exhibition of 80 selected works continues until 12 March 2017.
2017 Award Winners
Major Award - $10,000
Molly Morpeth Canaday Trust
Kirstin Carlin
New Lynn (Auckland)
Through the Trees (Thirteen)
Oil on board
A feisty freshness pervades this painting, a welcome shot of visual adrenalin delivered directly through the eyeballs. Carlin’s work can be appreciated on a number of levels: as a high-voltage re-imagining of the work-worn landscape genre; as a study in colour (those glowing greens and lustrous pinks jostling up against creamy neutrals); or as a technical exercise in construction, with spatial relationships vigorously amplified and outlined in black. That’s all there, and ready to be enjoyed, but if I’m honest it’s not why I selected it for this award. I chose it because of its sheer ‘look at me’ audacity, that playful, bustling confidence which lands it just on the right side of cheek. It’s a cracker.
Craigs Investment Partners Youth Art Award - $2,500
Anita Frost
Auckland
Drawing of the alphabet
Pen
A simple but appealing idea, delivered with impressive precision and focus. The title of this work makes it clear what we will see, and yet the sense of formal order implied in that no-nonsense description is thoroughly undermined by the labyrinthine tangle that vibrates before us. One slip of the pen and it would all be undone, but the artist has prevailed, creating a satisfying workout for both eyes and mind.
Highly Commended Award
Arts Whakatane Award - $1,000
Raewyn Whaley
Auckland
Between
Oil on canvas
Painted with oil on canvas, this captivating work reverberates with an elusive fluidity more commonly associated with watercolour. Exquisite, nuanced and leaving plenty to the viewer's imagination, it is a masterclass in knowing just when to stop.
Highly Commended Award
Pullar Family Trust Award - $1,000
Michelle Reid
Riverhead
Afterimage Series 5/6/7/8
Ink and acrylic on board
With its luminous quartet of panels that operate both separately and together, this modestly-scaled work packs a powerful visual punch. Confidently outlining a range of abstract yet allusive forms, the brushstrokes are both delicate and intense, with an inviting fragility and depth that suggests a ceramic glaze.
Highly Commended Award
Akel Family Award $1,000
Donna-Marie Patterson
Christchurch
Moonlight Secrets
Hand drawn ink on 100% cotton paper
Doing a lot with relatively little, this simple work evokes a convincing sensation of movement, as the oscillating lines seem to float and alter in space. With such a minimal method of mark-making, there is little room for error, yet this artist has created an inviting work that commands attention with its delicacy and skill.
Highly Commended Award
Marion and Jack Schulte Award $1,000
V, I Edwards + Johann
Christchurch
On the Seam of Things – Constellations #8
Drawing on C-type photograph
An elegant essay in the art of juxtaposition, this work combines photography and drawing to compelling effect. Vast natural forces, threatening to collide, loom beside a figure-like form that has been assembled from an inexplicable convergence of materials. Rods of colour connect the two compositional fields, imbuing the work with a sense of mysterious and unstable energy.
Merit Award - $500
Browne School of Art
Francis van Hout
Christchurch
Colour Field, Grey Space
Oil on board
In its geometric forms, colour palette and even framing style, this modestly-scaled work makes obvious reference to the traditions of modernist painting. It soon becomes apparent that something else is afoot here, however, as an artfully-deployed wonkiness sets it adrift from pious homage into far less certain, far more interesting waters.
Merit Award - $500
4 Art Sake Gallery
Esther Deans
Avondale
Self Portrait
Oil on canvas
Of all of the portraits in this exhibition, this is perhaps the most understated, and yet it lingers in the eye and mind. Combining fragmenting views, dissolving planes and uncertain perspectives, it values complexity over clarity, offering an intriguing approach to a familiar genre.
Merit Award - $500
Scott Jarrett at Professionals
Connah Podmore
Wellington
Wall, 8.25 pm
Charcoal on paper
A subject that could not be more ordinary has been recorded with such extraordinary skill and attention that it resonates with a quiet dignity and sense of significance.
Merit Award - $500
Hon. Anne Tolley MP
Whakatane Society of Arts and Crafts
Denise Durkin
Wellington
Virginia 2
Charcoal on paper
This satisfying and deftly-worked study is just 'undone' enough to keep you looking. Executed with undeniable skill, admirable restraint and an alertness to the power of empty space, it exudes both confidence and control.
Merit Award - $500
Gordon Harris Ltd (product value)
Sam Dollimore
Porirua
(Who’s To Blame For These) Terrible Manhandles
Ink pen on paper
Using only ink pen on paper, Dollimore has created a remarkably convincing Illusion of soft, yielding flesh. From a distance the subject is indistinct, but the merest suggestion of recognisable form draws you closer, then confronts you with an unexpectedly voyeuristic jolt as the shapes of an unknown body slowly reveal themselves.
Merit Award - $500
Frames by Daniel – (product value)
Josephine Cachemaille
Nelson
Dark Roller
Acrylic on board
It might be lurking in a corner, but this is no shrinking violet. With its glistening, shifting surface, Dark Roller aggressively challenges our sense of space, tumbling towards us with a confidence that borders on menace.
Local Artist Award - $500
Ross and Kay Boreham
Accounting Biz Limited
Mandy Hague
Whakatāne
It’s the Real Thing
Acrylic on cotton rag paper
Contrasting a delicate organic ecosystem with the all-too-familiar shape of the ubiquitous plastic soft drink bottle, this understated but exquisitely observed work plays with ideas of containment, protection and authenticity.
About the Judge — Felicity Milburn
Kay Boreham – Floor Talk
Kay Boreham looked back on the history of the event, from its inception in 1986, through its various phases, trials and tribulations that have seen it grown into one of the country’s most keenly contested Art Awards.
11 am Monday, 30 January at Te Kōputu a te whanga a Toi – The Whakatāne Library and Exhibition Centre.
