Exhibitions

Apprehend

the dirtiness of this time

Self-fulfilling weak egos

Of such human uncaring

 

Looking at You explores the idea that life - human survival - functions according to the rules of a game; with the goal being power and freedom. And like a game, people are motivated or manipulated through incentives or disincentives to do what is asked of them. Incentives like the promise of money, sex, religious salvation, political power, and disincentives like emotional and sexual withdrawal, violence, intimidation, judgment, religious pressure and sexual violation. Used by the right person and in the right circumstances they can easily persuade an individual to give up control of a situation, or influence a change in direction, or induce confusion in the participants.

 

The works are about persecution, lack of accountability, desire for power/control, confusion, secrets, the connections and disconnections between people, darkness and light, the marginal and transitional nature of living, the nervousness of the world, the fear of fear itself, and the justification of bad behaviour, for example, being absolved of a crime because it is done in the ‘name of god’ or government.

 

I wanted to explore how New Zealanders (and the world in general) make quick judgements on media-presentation of facts and how we seem to have become de-sensitised to the atrocities in the world. Some of the paintings show the persecution of individual people while groups of people stand by inert. These groups seem powerful because of their numbers and strength but powerless to do anything to help because of confusion over interpretation of events, unwillingness to assist, ignorance, or from fear. Possibly, the fictionalisation of other people’s tragedies in the media mean that dangerous/violent confrontations between people in public and private can sometimes be interpreted as ‘harmless’ domestics, or, we spin the fairytale ideas in our heads that someone else will come to the rescue, or, we think that if something is horribly wrong then surely someone else in the group would have reacted.

 

Theatre plays a big role in my paintings as a way of looking at the manner in which people function within society. Theatre parodies the social world and allows us to look at ourselves from an outsider’s perspective, provoking thoughts and questions about our actions. It manages to highlight ‘the self’ as a fictional being masquerading in society, choosing how to play, when to play, and who to play. As such, theatrical settings are an integral part of these works. Theatre-like lighting defines space or creates barriers, bringing characters or issues to prominence, and homogeneous figures are painted in so that the focus is on the actions and not the identity of the people. Hands of figures define intent; they are bound, pointing blame, pleading for help, questioning, pensive, accusatory, placating, hurting, or resisting the actions of others. These hands are intended to say so much more than the faces of the figures.

- Susanne Kerr, 2007