The Govett-Brewster Art Gallery in partnership with the Western Institute of Technology presents Gabriel Kuri, the Gallery’s 2006 International Artist in Residence.
Mexican-born, Belgium-based Kuri will present new works developed during his residency in his first exhibition in New Zealand, and thanks in advance.Kuri is internationally recognised for an artistic practice that embraces sculpture installations, drawings and photographs.
Curated by Mercedes Vicente, and thanks in advance features a series of sculptures made from found common objects such as rocks, till receipts, children’s toys and painted glass.
Vicente says “Kuri’s work inserts wry observations of everyday life into the terrain of formal aesthetics, resulting in witty and poetic pieces that challenge how we look at the world around us.”
The appearance and form of Kuri’s objects are at odds with the stories they tell. Applying language games, twisted semantics, artifice and illusion to a variety of common materials and situations, Kuri reconfigures the grammar of everyday experience to articulate new symbolic meanings.
Gallery Director Rhana Devenport says “the Gallery is honoured to be working so closely with an artist who has a deservedly strong international presence. The project furthers cultural connections across Mexico, Europe and New Zealand and the Gallery’s important Artist in Residency programme.”
Kuri’s work is held in private and public collections throughout the world including Tate Modern, London, the Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, the Museum of Contemporary Art, San Diego and the La Colección Jumex in Mexico City.
A graduate of the Escuela Nacional de Artes Plasticas at the University of Mexico City and Goldsmith’s College, London, Kuri has exhibited widely in Europe and the Americas.
The exhibition, supported by Creative New Zealand, will be accompanied by a catalogue published by the Govett-Brewster Art Gallery and available through the Gallery’s Art and Design Shop in early 2007.
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