Poles Apart – Catherine, Barry and John Smith
Friday 3 February – Thursday 1 March 2012
Selwyn Gallery kicks off the year with an incredible exhibition about the Arctic and Antarctic.
For their second exhibition together at the Selwyn Gallery Barry, Catherine and John Smith have chosen the theme of “Poles Apart” to commemorate the centenary of Amundsen and Scott’s journey to the South Pole and the heroic era of polar exploration.
They revisit, through both expressionism and realism, the natural power of wind and ice, the massive landforms, and the immense vastness of these polar regions.
John Smith has been making photographic images since his early teens. He has had a life time love of the outdoors and is never without his camera. His two Arctic expeditions are the focus of this current exhibition. As well as holding numerous exhibitions here and overseas, he is also a co-author of several books detailing the incredible journeys he has made.
Catherine Smith is a painter and endevours to engage aspects of Nature’s movement, chemistry, colour and form through expressionism and abstraction. The opportunity to journey south by ship from Bluff, New Zealand to Antarctica was overwhelming to the senses and further fuelled her advocacy for the environment. Catherine has been a member of an exhibiting Art Co-operative for many years and has had her work in various exhibitions all over New Zealand.
Barry Smith shows us his printmaking skills at the gallery with his woodcuts. The subject matter of his art reflects his passion of the outdoors, as does his creative writing which has been published here and abroad as poems and vignettes. His artwork is represented in Australasia and Europe and he has exhibited his work all over the country for a number of years.
We are thrilled to host such an exciting exhibition at Selwyn Gallery and invite you to come along and truly experience the Arctic and Antarctica as seen by these talented artists, soak up images of a place most of us can only imagine