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Events and Happenings
Photography Exhibition
An exhibition of 12 limited edition signed photographs from Grahame Sydney's time on Ross Island will open
in Christchurch on the 20th March. The prints are 700mm wide, colour on archival paper, in editions of 10.
" It is an enviable privilege to have twice been guest of Antarctica New Zealand at Scott Base - the first journey South during November/December 2003, the second in October 2006. Temperatures there at those times of year make the habitual tools of painters like me - pencil and paper, with some watercolour notes perhaps - quite impossible on the ice, and I quickly realised I would have to adapt and make the camera my medium. These images are selected from the many hundreds I shot during those four weeks on and around Ross Island.
All photographs are digital images and have not been altered since their taking. My hope is that when everyone can return home with stunning pictures, so astonishing is the Antarctic environment and so easy the digital technology, I can still emerge with a quality of work which reeks of my own vision, my own hand, unlike any other. Its my hope that when people study these rather minimal images they still find the unmistakable "Sydney" manner and style. Its a tall order, but worth trying.
I found that what I wanted to do with the "landscape" there, how I felt about it, was a little different to what others do and feel - and that's the way it should be. Art is experience distilled through the personality, and in the remarkable, sterile and subtle world of the Ice I found mirrored a great deal of myself."
For further details please contact Bob Munro at the Salamander Gallery:
www.salamandergallery.co.nz
Ph (03) 365 9279
Antarctica: The Big Ice
Otago Museum's outstanding summer exhibition Antarctica: The Big Ice captures the true essence of the world's southernmost continent.
Be inspired by the beauty and grandeur of this engaging exhibition and take the opportunity to experience the first significant exhibition of the photography of Grahame Sydney from his recent visits south. The exhibition features 80 of Grahame's photographs and two paintings, along with a taste of the inspired works from a variety of New Zealand artists, including Neville Peat and Andris Apse.
Grahame has now visited Antarctica twice and his most recent trip in October 2006 produced the majority of the images for this exhibition.
Commemorating 50 years of New Zealand's presence in Antarctica, International Polar Year and Scott Base's 50th Birthday, Antarctica: The Big Ice celebrates our strong relationships, past, present and future with earth's most extreme land.
Be captivated by the Antarctic aesthetic, delve into the history, discover the science, contemplate the politics and explore with the heroes. Most of all, be inspired by the last great wilderness. See sledges used by Scott and Shackleton on their courageous expeditions and take a close look at the ice axe Sir Edmund Hillary used to carve steps in the polar plateau as he lead his team to the South Pole. Try out a polar tent for size, ride a skidoo or dress yourself for an Antarctic expedition.
Made possible with the support and talents of Imagelab and Antarctica New Zealand, the Otago Museum is proud to have designed and produced this exhibition, which starts its life in Dunedin before touring to other communities around New Zealand.
Showing December 2006 – May 2007 in the Special Exhibitions Gallery, FREE!
Antarctica Revisited
Grahame Sydney returns for his second visit to Scott Base, Antarctica on Friday October 13th, at the invitation of Antartica New Zealand. He will spend a week there gathering more material for future paintings. Photos taken during this visit to Antarctica will be combined with his previous 2003 images in a major Summer exhibition at the Otago Museum, Dunedin. This Antarctic exhibition opens on 15th December and the museum staff hope that it will have a touring life both within NZ and Australia.
Grahame Sydney Talk "32 Years of Solitary Confinement"
On Sunday 8th October at 2pm Grahame Sydney will be presenting a public talk entitled "32 Years of Solitary Confinement" - a discussion of
thoughts and philosophies on work and quality after 3 decades of professional activity. This is a fundraising event and tickets can be
purchased from the Christchurch Public Art Gallery.
A related event on the same day is an exhibition of 14 of Grahame's stone lithographs. The collection is that of Maree Ritchie and will be
offered for sale at her Worchester Gallery, Worchester Boulevard, Christchurch at 4.30pm.
Grahame Sydney Documentary
A great 22 minute Sonja de Friez documentary of Grahame Sydney will show on TV1 at 10.30pm on Sunday 25 June 2006. A preview of it can be found on the Raconteur website
http://www.raconteur.co.nz/documentary.html.
‘It is difficult to think of the parched central Otago landscape that makes up the majority of the lower South Island without thinking about Grahame Sydney.
This association has grown and developed since the outset of his career in the mid 70's, when his egg tempera paintings articulated a sense of place that struck both a regionalist
and nationalist nerve. Barren woolsheds, road signs, cloud formations or portraits, whatever the subject, such is the universal appeal of Sydney's work that Elton John, Nelson Mandela
and Sam Neil own his paintings. Sam Neil is "always keen to see what Grahame is going to do next." Sydney fans are more widespread than most. Such is the popularity of his work
that his paintings are sold to a private waiting list, and many have never been seen publicly. His lithographs are eagerly awaited and quickly sell out. Poet Brian Turner poses the
question "Why people want to keep Grahame Sydney in a box as a landscape artist."' Grahame Sydney Radio Interview
The Gore radio station, Hokonui Gold, interviewed Grahame on their Hearty Breakfast show on the eve of the Art Escape dinner, art exhibition and auction. You can copy and paste the direct link to the interview
into your browser window to hear the full interview http://www.hokonuigold.co.nz/breakfast/sydney170306.wma.
'Rozzie at Pisa' voted one of New Zealand's top ten paintings
Television arts show, Frontseat, has listed its viewer's top ten in a search for the greatest New Zealand painting. Grahame Sydney's Rozzie at Pisa is there along with
Colin McCahon (Gate III, Northland Panels, Six Days in Nelson and Canterbury, The Promised Land), Rita Angus (Self-portrait and Cass) Robin White (Fish and Chip, Maketu),
Bill Hammond (Watching for Buller) and Petrus Van der Velden (A Waterfall in Otira Gorge).
Frontseat asked a group of New Zealand's art experts to provide them with recommendations of paintings that should be in the running. A selection of these was put on the Frontseat
website, and viewers were asked to either vote for one of these, or to nominate a different painting.
The greatest New Zealand painting, as voted by Frontseat viewers, was Cass, by Rita Angus. Artist and curator Gregory O'Brien told TV One's arts show, Frontseat, the top 10 paintings were consistent for their focus on the land but Cass stood above the others as an example of great New Zealand painting.
Cass was painted in 1936 after a sketching expedition to Arthurs Pass and signed as Rita Cook, Angus's then married name. The picture is on public display in the Christchurch Art Gallery.
Advisor for the 2006 Montana New Zealand Book Awards
The prestigious Montana New Zealand book awards for 2006 are to be judged by peers. The judging of the awards is carried out across eight categories, each with a specialist advisor to assist the judging panel. Two writers and a publisher will make up the panel, supported by eight category advisors and one Te Reo advisor, all with writing and publishing backgrounds.
This year's advisors also boast strong writing and publishing credentials and Grahame Sydney has been selected as an advisor for the Illustrative Award. The Art of Grahame Sydney won the Montana Medal for Non Fiction in 2000.
Grahame Sydney Graphic Works Exhibiton - Forrester Gallery, Oamaru
The Grahame Sydney Graphic Works exhibition draws together 32 etchings, lithographs and drawings from Grahame's private collection. The etchings and graphic
works in the exhibition date from 1975 through to 2004, and feature a variety of subjects, from the familiar and much loved Central Otago landscapes, through
to intense portraits and figure studies. Originally developed to complement the official opening of the John Money Wing at the Eastern Southland Gallery,
this intimate and finely detailed exhibition shows at the Forrester Gallery in Oamaru from 17 March 2006 until 17 April 2006. The gallery is at 9 Thames St, Oamaru, is open daily from 10:30 - 4:30 and can be contacted on 03 434 1653.
45 Below; An Antarctic Summer
A Grahame Sydney painting and photos from his Antarctic visit will be shown at an exhibition titled '45 Below; An Antarctic Summer' at the Forrester Gallery
in Oamaru from the 18th November 2005 to the 27th January 2006. The exhibition also includes artists Dee Copland, Kathryn Madill, Nigel Brown, Fieke Neuman, Bill Manhire, Bernadette Hall, Herbert Ponting and Edward Wilson. The exhibition will open with a dance from local choreographer and Antarctica Arts Fellow Bronwyn Judge on the 18th of November.
For details about the Forrester see www.forrestergallery.com.
eCard Competition
Thanks for all the entries into the December eCard competition. The winner of the 5 mounted mini prints is J. Brodie from New Zealand.
As it is Christmas, and there is a slightly damaged large print to give away, an additional draw was made. The winner of that print is S. Anderson, also from New Zealand.
Outdoor Sculpture Exhibition, Olssen's Vineyard
Grahame Sydney gave a very thought provoking talk at the outdoor sculpture exhibition at Olssen's Vineyard, Bannockburn, Central Otago on Labour weekend. An excerpt from the talk:
"Good and great works must be good memories, companions for life, companions which remain fascinating, challenging ideally, and pleasing for our closeness to them. We may not look at them long and lovingly, but they are locked securely within, and travel with us wherever we go. We may never understand them, like our own children we never really understand. But we love them all our lives, and they sing like the songs of birds inside us.
Courage in the making, courage in the supporting - these risks are best rewarded. Understanding and explanation are not always necessary - to try to do so often sterilises the mystery and kills the lingering, lasting wonder. Hope instead for something you can't forget, no matter how much else crowds your head. The song of a bird inside us.
And if you can't forget it, you know you've seen something wonderful. You may even be fortunate enough, as its caretaker, to be able to look at it for a minute or two every now and then."
NZ Opera Fund Raiser
A Grahame Sydney lithograph titled Morning will be auctioned off at a fund raiser for NZ Opera. The event will be held in the Britomart Pavillion in Auckland on Thursday 27 October 2005.
For details about the event please contact Paul Dougherty on paul@nzopera.co.nz.
Exhibition Floor Talk
The Grahame Sydney exhibition which features 32 lithographs, etchings and drawings dating from 1975 - 2004 is showing at the the Lakes District Museum in Arrowtown from 26 August - 23 October 2005. Grahame has also agreed to present two floor talks on Thursday 1st September. There will be one at 5.30pm and one at 7.45pm. These are for museum members only and numbers are restricted to 50 people per floor talk. Please phone the museum reception (03 442 1824) to book a place on a first in first served basis.
Festival Closing Concert
Timeless Land, the multi-media work that celebrates the majesty of the Maniototo landscape, is the closing night gala concert for the Christchurch Arts Festival on Saturday 6 August. Combining the painting of Grahame Sydney, the poetry of Brian Turner and the prose of Owen Marshall, with the music of Anthony Ritchie and the film of NHNZ, this work evokes the grandeur and beauty of Central Otago. For full festival details, and other works performed by the Christchurch Symphony, visit the 'Applaud' Christchurch Arts Festival 2005 website, www.artsfestival.co.nz.
Festival of Colour
The inaugural Festival of Colour is on from 27 April through to 1 May 2005. Festival activities take place over five exciting days of performances and exhibitions surrounded by the spectacular colours of autumnal Lake Wanaka. Grahame Sydney is part of the festival activities through "Artists at Work". You can visit with Grahame at 12.30pm on Friday 29 April in the Infinity Pacific Crystal Palace where he will discuss his inspiration, his art and his working environment.
Slow art in the Maniototo
An interesting, candid conversation with Grahame Sydney is in the September-October New Zealand Geogrpahic. Grahame talks of his early involvement with the Maniototo and the 'magnificent vast empty interior of Otago' which he found to reflect his own character and personality.
'I'm a great believer in the idea that every painting you do should be an autobiographical revelation. My type of painter believes that the legacy of your work is the story of your life, in all its oddity and uniqueness. There is something about the landscape here which plainly means a lot to me, and I am constantly trying to explore that notion. I love the barrenness and skeletal boniness of it. I like the way the structure is so close to the surface. The veneer upon which we live and tread our paths is incredibly stretched and thin here. It's a starvation landscape. Also, whether it's people like me living here, or farmers trying to make a living, it's a bit of a battle. There's no luxury. I like that. Good things don't come easy, in my philosophy.'
Stanley Spencer in Dunedin
Grahame Sydney was invited to open the Spencer exhibition at the Dunedin Public Art Gallery. A short exercpt from a piece he wrote on this called "Everyday Miracles" follows. The full article can be found in the Reviews section.
'One of the first reproductions of an art work I ever pinned to my bedroom wall, the bedroom I pretended was my first ever studio as a schoolboy in the 1960's, was Michael Smither's painting 'St Francis in Ecstasy in the Garden of Eden', carefully torn from the NZ Women's Weekly. In the accompanying article Michael paid his great respects to the English painter whose work and example had given him the courage to try to be an artist' Stanley Spencer.
Southern Sinfonia "Timeless Land"
Grahame Sydney's art was showcased in a spectacular way at the Dunedin Arts and Cultural Events this month, February 2004. Southern Sinfonia "Timeless Land" featured the world premiere performance of a very special new multi-artform work, showcasing the very best of Otago's art and artists expressing their feelings towards their land: Grahame Sydney, Brian Turner, Owen Marshall, Anthony Ritchie and NHNZ (Natural History New Zealand).
The work consisted of new orchestral music composed by Anthony Ritchie performed by the Southern Sinfonia with soprano soloist Deborah Wai Kapohe, along with the screening of Grahame Sydney's paintings and specially compiled film by NHNZ.
Brian Turner and Owen Marshall read from their writings during the performance which was under the baton of Southland-born conductor Ken Young.
Grahame Sydney, Patron of Waitaki First
Grahame Sydney, in an article in the Otago Daily Times, declares some of his reasons for believing the proposed Project Aqua on the Waitaki River to be an unforgivable mistake.
Please remember: we are not owners of this earth, these landscapes. We are nothing more than brief occupiers, caretakers charged with its maintenance and well-considered nurture. What we do to the landscape becomes the legacy our children and theirs inherit. This project is a 60km-long, straight-edged, six-storey high gutter subdividing the river valley like a giant Berlin Wall, filled to the brim with a sluggish flow wide enough for a ship or two, and leaving a sad and pathetic once-was-beautiful braided, natural riverbed dead and overgrown to one side. If you think this is going to add beauty to our southern land, and be a valuable legacy, then I am indeed from Mars.
It is ill-conceived, inappropriate and anachronistic - a monument to short-sightedness, and I have no sympathy whatsoever for those directly involved with delivering it into our midst.
The Art of Grahame Sydney Reprinted
The Art of Grahame Sydney is newly reprinted and autographed copies are available in the Gallery. This is the 3rd reprint of this popular hard cover book that includes 143 reproductions, 9 photographs and a list of the artworks, exhibition history and biographical notes.
An Officer of the NZ Order of Merit (ONZM)
Grahame Sydney can add Officer of the New Zealand Order of Merit, for services to painting, to his impressive list of achievements. For almost 30 years Sydney's paintings have been inspirational with their ability to evoke a sense of wonder and kinship. His works are sought after by local and international buyers as well as being held in the collections of New Zealand's major galleries, including Te Papa's national collection.
Earlier in 2003, the New Zealand Herald stated that Sydney was one of the "hot" artists in New Zealand art. Now his ability to connect with people through his art has official government recognition.
"If nothing else, what it really shows when people like me get an award like this, is that New Zealand arts patronage has the courage to back its own."
Trapped in Luxury
Grahame Sydney, reporting from Scott Base, Antarctica, 2 December 2003
'Cracks aplenty wait to swallow the unwary, and are marked by black flags which thanks to the fresh dumping are now
two or three feet shorter, some gone completely. Snow makes cracks and crevasses more treacherous, because normal surface
signs are obliterated by the powder. In the sharp silver grey light of near-midnight, we shake the dry snows from our legs,
and notice the black triangle of Observation Hill, between us and McMurdo Base, is now ghostly in its new pale cover. The
flags hang limp on their thin bamboo stalks, pacing out across the empty void which is the Ross Ice Shelf and disappearing
in the white-page perspective lesson of this eerie, quiet place.
There's a slight breeze as we pile into the 4-wheel drive Toyota, but within minutes, up on the gap road, it has suddenly
become a major blow, over 25 knots, and all that snow from yesterday is flying, making visibility difficult. Another minute
and we're down to a crawl, the driver unable to see the road in the white out, so two of us walk closely in front, snail's
pace and hunched against the bitter wind. For the first time I feel the violence of the storms Scott and others knew too
well, and the lacerating sting of snow in Antarctic wind. My hands, foolishly ungloved but driven deep into jacket pockets,
are stinging already, my jeans poor insulation in this. We're only minutes from Scott Base, but all I can see is the yellow
vehicle a few yards behind me.'
Summer trip to the Antarctic
Grahame Sydney will be spending some of his summer in the Antarctic this year. Jane Smith of the ODT reports:
'Mr Sydney was invited to spend two weeks in the Antarctic in November as part of Antarctica New Zealand's Invitational Arts Fellow programme and "did not have to think about it" before accepting.
"It's so unwordly and everyone who goes there finds it totally thrilling," he said.
Typically, he gathered notes and sketches on-site for paintings he later did in his studio, and he needed to find out how best to do that in subzero temperatures.
"One has images of water colour freezing on to brushes and ending up with a pencil," he said.
He was looking forward to "the variations in whiteness. The absolute minimal quality of land form itself,
just leaving you with a visual range of, I presume, extraordinary subtlety based around whiteness. I love that notion
because that's where I very much like to work - between abstraction and reality."
It would be "a test" to see if he could capture that subtlety but "that's the challenge that I accept with some excitement".'
Life Imitates Art
The Wedderburn community has raised $20,000 to move the Wedderburn railway goods shed made famous in Grahame Sydney's work, July on the Maniototo, back to Wedderburn. The goods shed had been used for storing coal in Idaburn, about 5km away. The coal mine is now closed and the shed, built in 1900, has been reinstated about 200m from its original site. The community hopes to give the shed its green look, and to have agricultural displays inside for the thousands who pass on the Otago Central Rail Trail every year.
Grahame Sydney said from Dunedin he was pleased the shed had returned to Wedderburn, but he did not know how much it had to do with his painting.
"It's famous as a symbolic nostalgic piece. I think it stood for so much; the rural farming way of life."
He sketched out the art work in the winter of 1974 and painted it over two to three weeks later that year and in early 1975.
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Timeless Land
'Out-of-print 1995 favourite by artist Grahame Sydney, poet Brian Turner and writer Owen Marshall gets a new lease on life thanks to a collaboration between original printer, Dunedin's Tablet Colour Print and Longacre Press. Tablet is using the plates for the last time on its old printing press before installing new technology. The print run will be short, and it will be on sale around the end of the month for a recommended retail price of $124.95. The 2000 Montana Medal winner The Art of Grahame Sydney, is now out of print.' Linda Herrick, Herald.
The website will put Timeless Land into the Gallery area for purchase as soon as it is available.
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Grahame Sydney's Art Sets Scene
The latest book from Owen Marshall, When Gravity Snaps', sets the scene with a Grahame Sydney image:
'Grahame Sydney's cover conveys the backdrop of the southern man, all that uncluttered space and that light unsullied by the airborne detritus of over-peopled places. And Marshall is truly a southern man, no trace of flamboyance in his appearance, demeanour or prose, modest and quiet, but with eyes as sharp as those of any contemporary writer.' Gordon McLauchlan, NZ Herald.
When Gravity Snaps was selected as a Dymock's Critics Choice this month. 'Sharp comedy, sadness, a pricking of pretensions and the search for human connection form New Zealand's finest short story writer, Owen Marshall.'
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eCard Competition Winnner
Congratulations to J. McPherson from Seattle, USA for being the winner of the latest Grahame Sydney eCard competition.
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Judging A Book By Its Cover
A Grahame Sydney image, Fog at Stan Cotter's, gave Brian Turner's new book the edge over 178 other
submissions. Turner's new book of poetry, Taking Off, was judged first equal Best
Cover in the 2002 Spectrum Print Book Design Awards. These awards have set out
to celebrate the book as an aesthetic object and to reward book designers. Taking
Off is designed by Sarah Maxey and published by Victoria University Press.
As well as Grahame Sydney's
art making Taking Off an award winner, it has also been short listed in the Montana
Book Awards. Brian Turner's first book of poems for a decade finds him in fine
voice. Taking Off distills the experiences of an eventful decade, with Brian Turner's
characteristic wit and feeling. The poems are of separation, the relationship
with his aging father, departed friends and of living life in Central Otago.
"That is the kind of raw
material every poet welcomes and Turner has the sense to tell it straight rather
than clutter it with imagery or filter it through metaphor. Turner is, after all,
the Southern Man's poet, friend of the stark realist painter Grahame Sydney whose
striking landscapes never feature people." Sarah Putt, XTRA
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