MICHAEL MOORE
SURVEY
3 - 14 June

Helene Phillips from Ferner Gallery will be giving a floor talk at the gallery on Tuesday, June 2 and at 12.30pm Sunday, June 6 at 2pm.

This exhibition highlights the role of the Centre of Contemporary Art as an institution that links the art world and the wider community of Canterbury. Corporate Art Hire focuses upon the gallery's capacity to exhibit the work of New Zealand artists in offices, public institutions, corporate foyers, and local businesses. The gallery currently has close to 1000 works on hire in the Canterbury region, and the success of the scheme has resulted in CoCA initiating a temporary hire programme. The gallery sources work for a client from an artist, and hires the work on their behalf. While on hire the artwork remains the property of the artist but during this period it is also possible to purchase the work. It provides an opportunity to place art into the community, usually in a public space.

This exhibition provides a snapshot of the range of work that is hired, and is available for hire, from this successful venture. Corporate Art Hire is an exhibition that will be of special interest to the business community, or public institution committed to animating and enriching the work environment.

CATHERINE MANCHESTER
CONFLUXUS
17 June - 4 July

Confluxus: From the word conflux, confluence L: Confluxus. Stream joining another of the same size from. L: con fluere flow. In Confluxus, Manchester's exploration of life, and the 'inter-dependence and independence of all forms,' is char-acterised by the presence of the human figure as a vehicle to establish various philosophical codes and values.

Untitled CATHERINE MANCHESTER

'My figures strive for oneness. The reduction of lines to an almost filament proportions emphasises their frailty, and also their energies, spiritual and vital... Like molecules, the figures converge, forming clusters, regrouping and forming again. The Buddhist writer, artist, and poet, Sri Chinmoy writes that 'Oneness is an ever transcending, ever manifesting and ever fulfilling beyond.' Manchester's art is firmly based on her experiences of life in Christchurch in the late 1990s. 'Separation and unity are dual concepts explored through graffiti motifs from Eastside in Christchurch. Adolescent perceptions can be revealing as they so often embody their parents or society's attitudes.' 'By concentrating on essential lines only, the figures confer a state of unity and confluence in each other.'

In the twentieth century dreams have occupied a crucial position in the practice of contemporary art. From the early modernism of the Russian artist Chagall to the recent post-modernism of Seraphine Pick, the displacement of the real world for remembered fragments of experience, has evoked both the unsettling and the comforting. This members exhibition invities contributing artists to consider the possibility of the world as a shifting, fractured actuality, or as an environment in which ambitions and aspirations are pursued, to be broken or fulfilled. Members are invited to submit works for this exhibition on or before Tuesday 2 June.

Philip Trusttum follows the success of the Motif exhibition at CoCA in 1996 with a new series of works based upon the human form. With an exhibition career spanning more than 35 years Trusttum is capable of working with colour on the painted surface on a scale that few of his contemporaries can match. Writer Warwick Brown referred to Trusttum's recent work as more "sparse and dry" than his work of the seventies, but ultimately "all the richer for its restraint."

Trusttum has said of his work; "I believe that an artist doesn't belong anywhere, you should paint what affects you. But having said that, it doesn't really matter what you paint. If you paint it for yourself, you knock the New Zealand art scene for six."

Piera is now painting permanently in New Zealand after a long career spent overseas during which she and Ambassador husband John McArthur lived in many capitals - Paris (three times), Brussels (twice), New York, Rome, Santiago and finally Moscow. She continued to paint during these years, immensely enriched by the sophisticated life she found. While sending work home regularly, she exhibited in Paris, London, Sydney, New York, and was the first New Zealander to have a one-man show at the New Tretyakov Gallery (Dom Khudoshnikov) in Moscow. She says she came of age as a painter among the Russians.

Her work buzzes with excitement and daring. Line, colour, composition, are handled "with sureness and passion". Courageous brush strokes hover between abstract and figurative art, radiating fun and a lively, powerful presence. She calls herself a "painter", anxious to shun the cerebral convolutions of many "artists". She says, "What really matters is whether a painting is good. Trends are irrelevant." The main theme of her work is man in his permanency; a theatrical quality

comes from a long acquaintance with the world of theatre and ballet. The show is about the free use of paint and colour and the ability to draw. The title is self-explanatory: "PAINT ALIVE".

Paul Klee once described the bio-morphic world of his art as the outcome of taking a line for a walk. This exhibition takes its inspiration from this idea that artists who work with paint frequently sidestep the demands of model-ling form and dealing with tone, to explore the graphic possibilities of paint on canvas. "Taking a Line for a Walk" features the work of Mark Braunias, Violet Fagan, William Hammond, Tom Kriesler, Mark Lander and Seraphine Pick.

Paul Chapman's art deals with familiar icons of popular culture, drawing attention to the way in which we all attach personal meaning and identity to them. This forthcoming show consists of large paintings, and deals with popular iconography through colour and its association. The works are 1.9 x 1.9 metres and comprise of a colour field and motif. Chapman's imagery is personal, as well as appropriated from graphics and images such as confectionery wrappers, cigarettes packages, food labels, and the likes. The very stuff of everyones existence. New Works is an extension of previous ideas by Chapman which dealt with similar themes via the screen printing medium. However, now Chapman's art demonstrates a greater involvement with painterly issues, mark making and scale. Although referencing Warhol, and postmodernist practice Chapman's art exudes a user-friendly sentimentality that makes it richly accessible and disarming.

Oamaru's Forrester Gallery had initiated a number of photographic exhibitions since 1990, collaborating with local photographers to explore themes of relevance to this 'heartland' community. In these 24 photographic works, first exhibited at Forrester Gallery in 1993, former Oamaru Mail photographer Anthony McKee presents images of men, and captures an essence of the day to day life in the town.

McKee was born in Christchurch in 1964 and decided early on to pursue a photographic career. Through the 1980's he became an active member of the Christchurch Photographic Society and worked part-time as a wedding photographer.

Christchurch photographer Richard Poole, whom McKee began assisting in 1988, suggested that completing a full-time photography course would be the best way into the industry. In 1989 McKee attended the Wellington Polytechnic's professional photographic course, where his final portfolio focussed on documentary, portraiture, and fashion work. In 1990 McKee won the Community News Association's young photographer of the year award. Having worked on newspapers in Christchurch, Oamaru and Napier, McKee is now a freelance photographer based in Christchurch.

In the photographs in this exhibition McKee's insights make a statement that viewers will find entertaining, amusing, and essentially moving. Although dealing with the community of a specific town, McKee's images are universal in their capacity to describe the ambitions, morality and lifestyle of New Zealand and its people.