Social Realism by Brit Bunkley

Stalin's Head, 2014

Social Realism

Brit Bunkley

19 November to 06 December 2014

Brit Bunkley’s Social Realism looks to the icons of nationalist Neo-Classical art, as the artist continues his investigations in 3-D modelling and printing. 

The Classical art genre has been used to serve the agendas of Fascists and Stalinists, colonialists, capitalists, and the military. Classical motifs are seen throughout the West in seats of governments, universities, banks, and along Wall Street. Bunkley’s subject matter is a reminder that Classicism in art and architecture represents both the best and worst of European culture – domination, hegemony, and power, as well as the positive characteristics of the enlightenment – reason, liberalism, democracy, freedom, equality, and the pursuit of happiness.

Appropriating this ubiquitous imagery Bunkley creates his own spin on Classicism with revisions and alterations that query convention. The artist’s ongoing treatment of 3-D printing is evident across the exhibition, as he experiments both with creating his own models and manipulating prototypes sourced online; many scans of Classical sculptures are freely available in the public domain.

Bunkley reworks forms in such a way that the intention shifts completely: a bust of Stalin is reproduced with a gaping hole through his head; Classical figures are bent and appear wilted; the roof of a Classical temple is disrupted by a jet plane in flight. In another work a bust of Napoleon is overwritten with his famous quote “The revolution is over, I am the revolution.”

“Whether video, public object or a drawing of a 3D wireframe model, Bunkley’s work is all in essence sculpture: how material and the shapes it might take express our relationship to the world. Natural or synthetic, he is concerned with the construction of things, how a material’s potential might be extended, and how everything is ultimately made from a series of building blocks or pixels.” – Mark Amery, 2013


BIOGRAPHY

Born: New York, USA

Lives: Whanganui, NZ

Education: Senior Lecturer in Sculpture and Digital Media, Quay School of Arts, Whanganui UCOL (1995-); Master of Fine Arts, Hunter College, New York, USA; Bachelor of Fine Arts, Minneapolis College of Art and Design, Minnesota, USA

Awards/Distinctions: EVA - Experimental Video Architecture – Special Mention, Best Idea Category (2013); The Wallace Art Awards – Finalist (2013); Now&After ’12, Moscow Museum of Modern Art, Russian Federation – Third Prize (2012); Sculpture Whanganui Award - Winner(2011); Connells Bay Temporary Installation Project, Connell’s Bay Sculpture Park, Auckland (2008); Wallace Arts Trust Grant (2005);Rome Prize Fellowship, Fellowship at the American Academy in Rome (1985-1986); Project Grant, New York State Council on the Arts (1983-1984); New York State Council on the Arts Artist's Fellowship Grant, Creative Artist's Program Service (1983); Artist's Fellowship, National Endowment for the Arts (1980-1981)

Collections: Whanganui District Council (Hear My Train a’ Comin’Commission); SarjeantGallery, Whanganui; The James Wallace Arts Trust, Auckland; The New Zealand Film Archive;Minnesota Percent for Art in Public Places,Minnesota History Center, USA; New York City College, USA; Bay Shore Train Station (N.Y.M.T.A., New York Arts for Transit, Commission)

Public Exhibitions (selected):Special Guest Programme, Filmessay, Castelfranco Veneto, Italy (2014); Melbourne Art Fair (2014); NZ Film Archive ViewFinder,Auckland Central Library (2014); 3D Printing and the Arts: What Things May Come, The Etter-Harbin Center, University of Texas (2014); CologneOFF X / animateCOLOGNE, Miden, Greece (2014); Digital Graffiti, Alys Beach, Florida (2014); 20th Anniversary, Center for the Digital Arts, Westchester Gallery, Peekskill, NY (2014); Open Doors Wedding, Zentrale, Berlin (2014);Odd Peer Nexus, The Young, Wellington (2014);The 10th Berlin International Directors Lounge [DLX], Berlin(2014); Hand, Eye, and Mind, India Habitat Centre, New Delhi, India (2013);Festival Images Contre Nature 2013 -International festival of experimental video, Théâtre des Chartreux, Marseille, France (2013); Video Art Festival Miden (Now&After ‘13), Kalamata, Greece (2013); CologneOFF IX, A Virtual Memorial Vilnius Lithuania, 2013, Kedainiai Regional Museum, Lithuania (2013); KANTOR: cultuurfestival in leegstaand kantoorpand, Amsterdam, The Netherlands (2013); Paradox of Plenty, Pah Homestead, TSB Bank Wallace Arts Centre, Auckland (2013); Oslo Screen Festival, Public screening at the Oslo Central Station, Norway (2013); Rosebank Artwalk/Sitework, Auckland Arts Festival (2013); White Night, Auckland Arts Festival (2013); Now&After ’12, Moscow Museum of Modern Art, Russian Federation (2012);Something in the Water, Sarjeant Gallery, Whanganui (2012); CologneOff8, META House, Phnom Penh (2012);  Budapest International Shortfilm Festival, Hungry (2012); ExTeresa, Arte Actual, Mexico City (2012); O:4W Film Festival, Cardiff, UK (2012); Dio-noia (Dioramas of Paranoia), The Suter Te Aratoi o Whakatu, Nelson (2011); E4C, ElectronicGallery, Seattle (2011); Images Contre Nature 2011, International Festival of Experimental Video, Théâtre des Chartreux, Marseille, France (2011);Sanctioned Array-Other2 Specify, WHITE BOX, New York (2010); Hybrids, Media and Interdisciplinary Arts Centre, Auckland (2010); Rencontres Internationales Madrid/Berlin/Paris, Reina Sofia National Museum, Madrid,The Haus der Kulturen der Welt, Berlin, The Centre Pompidou, Paris (2010); File 10 Nurbs Proto 4KT, Galeria De Arte Do Sesi, Sao Paolo, Brazil (2009); Urban Screens Melbourne 08, Australian Centre for the Moving Image, Melbourne (2008); 809 International New Image Art Festival, Yichang City, China (2008); Slow Train a’ Comin’, The New Zealand Film Archive Pelorus Trust Mediagallery, Wellington (2007); 404 Festival: 4th Edition, Trieste, Rome, Vienna, Hasselt (2007); Rural Vignettes, The New Zealand Film Archive Gallery, Wellington (2006); Following Gravity’s Rainbow, The New Zealand Film Archive Pelorus Trust Mediagallery, Wellington (2005); Signs (“and other similar entities”), Te Tuhi Centre for the Arts, Auckland (2002);  Monuments and Icons, Sarjeant Gallery, Whanganui (1998)

Publications/Articles: ‘Thinking well outside the box’ by Mark Amery, The Dominion Post, Feb 2014; ‘Brit Bunkley’ by Mark Amery, The New Zealand Listener, Mar 2013; ‘Return of the spider man’ by Linda Herrick, The NZ Herald, Sept 2013; ‘Train of Thought’, Art News New Zealand, Winter 2012; pg 24; Artsville, TVNZ, 2011 (Documentary); Marshall, John (ed), Perimeters, Boundaries and Borders, Manchester Institute for Research and Innovation in Art and Design, Lancaster, UK: Fast-uk, 2008, pp 40-41; Fleming, Ronald Lee, The Art of Placemaking: Interpreting Community Through Public Art and Urban Design, London: Merrell Publ., 2008, pp 84 -85; Bloodworth, Sandra and William Ayres,Along the Way: MTA Arts for Transit, Celebrating 20 Years of Public Art, New York: Monacelli Press, 2006


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