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Illuminations

“I am not an urban artist.

I have deep connections with the land and my work consistently celebrates light, land and water and the interface of human contact with these.

Kristin O’Sullivan Peren.

Introduction ‘Poplars’ (2003-05). Five members, Alexandra, Gibbston and Glenorchy schist and barbed wire over steel armatures, 200 x 50cms, varied circumferences.

Private collection, NZ.

‘Islands’ series (2005). Epoxy resin, 25 x 51cms.

Born in Rotorua, Kristin O’Sullivan Peren was educated locally, studied, and eventually worked with John Drawbridge at the Print Studio in Wellington City Art Gallery.

A period of teaching art education and travelling gave her an abiding appreciation of the importance of the environment and culture for the formation of identity and community. Together with her partner and two daughters she moved to Central Otago and practiced, she says, “the balancing act of producing wine, prints and sculpture and raising a family.”

Throughout the 1980-90s Peren printed prodigiously and, greatly encouraged by her mentor John Drawbridge, established her signature gestural mark in print series such as the ‘Islands’ (1995), and ‘The Irish’ (1996). In these she confronted excessive farming practices and advocated alternative sustainable systems, visually placing an emphasis upon light and water and drawing attention to displacements within the environment.

Subsequently, several significant sculptures eventuated: the monumental Poplars (200305), constructed from schist, and the more modest-scaled, ‘Islands’ (2005) series, caste in epoxy resin. In effect, the time, effort and skills involved in these led Peren towards her most substantial public statement: Papakura (2005-07), commissioned for the Frankton Events Centre and, in turn, inspired the print series, ‘Trying to Capture the Light’ (2007-08).

Papakura (2005-07).

Three epoxy resin forms approx. 3.7M x 60 x 40cms, each containing six rods of over 22,000 light-emitting-diode [LEDs], electronically programmed.

Aqualand, Queenstown Events Centre. Commissioned by the Queenstown Lakes District Council.

‘I measured the skies …’ (Kepler)

Papakura (which translates as red or glowing earth) celebrates the Aurora Australis (the southern lights), a natural light display produced by the collision of charged particles from the earth’s magnetosphere, mostly electrons, but also protons and heavier particles, with atoms and molecules of the earth’s upper atmosphere.

Peren’s concept was ambitious and complex. It aimed not only to make light (electromagnetic radiation) visible, but also to impart a sense of its dance of frequency and intensity.

Peren is no physicist. Research led her back to the work of two men introduced to her by her father: astronomer, Johannes Kepler (1571–1630) and atomist, Pierre Gassendi (1592–1655), and into prolonged experiments with epoxy resin and, simultaneously, the construction of electronically programmed LEDs to illuminate her selected medium.

“My father was an avid tramper and a great storyteller.

He’d seen the the Aurora Australis in Fjordland, on the Kepler track and he re-created the light in my head. But, the night Papakura was installed, just as my daughter and I were packing up, we turned and looked across Lake Wakatipu. There on the horizon, we saw the Aurora Australis – the original. It was a surreal moment, a fusion of the original and Papakura.”

The resulting sculpture, over three years in the making, comprises three monumental resin hull-like structures.

Sited limpet-like on the flank of the Frankton Events Centre in Queenstown, each form contains thousands of LEDs lights electronically programmed to gently dance unending sequences, like fossil filaments caught in amber.

4 INSERT IMAGE sequence No. 4 [two images]: ‘Trying to Capture the Light’ series, #I, #II (2007-08).

Monoprints, 76 x 57cms. Private collection, New Zealand.

Papakura and the print series ‘Trying to Capture the Light’ (2007-08), attracted considerable critical attention and signaled Peren as a sculptor and print maker deeply involved with ecological concerns.

These concerns were further explored in the ‘Illumination’ series of prints and sculptures in this present exhibition and affirm Peren’s belief that light (literal and philosophical) is an imperative in our lives.

These works were to be exhibited in the Ng Gallery in Christchurch. Happenstance found Peren en route between the gallery and the picture-framer when a major earthquake devastated much of the central business district and impacted on many peoples’ lives – including the artist.

Illuminations Peren questions ecological imbalances.

“Many of these,” she insists, “we can and must resolve. But first of all we’ve got to see the light!”

‘Illuminations’ suggests penetrating clarifications. Yet, at an initial glance, these unspecific ‘architectures’ appear the very antonym of elucidation: broody confusions and blurred instabilities wrought through urgent, energetic marks. There’s a sense of chaos. This, the artist says, was not laid down formerly beforehand, emphasizing the revelatory nature of the work, raw and immediate. “My work is neither idealist (Platonic) nor polemical. It concerns questions I ask myself about our endeavours and their consequences, some catastrophic. It springs from the belief that the sum (humanity) is greater than the parts (individuals). Surrounded as we are by chaos (environmental, social and political) it’s difficult to believe in any sort of coherent whole or principled order. This may sound pessimistic. Yet because much of this chaos is manufactured, it is possible to believe in positive emergent processes, in changes in communities’ attitudes and endeavours.

“I have done and respect those who continue to produce polished prints of fine lines and aquatints. But my choice is for expressive, gestural marks and the immediacy of the monoprint. My aim is to expressively re-connect us with our responsibilities and the recognition that we are related, part of the same experience – existence. The imagery of these prints and sculptures may suggest structures involving shape interactions played out sequentially over time, such as crystals crafted by the random motion of water molecules. But my marks should not be confused with literal presence.”

Across this present body of work Peren aims for and achieves tactility and sensuousness in structures resembling natural processes: emergent properties and possibilities.

In the ‘Breath’ series, densities hover, as though suspended, before evaporating in soft saturations that quietly surface and seep into the absence of ink and the white of paper space. Out of the fecund depths a single entity rises. The vagitus (birth cry) visualised? A breath of possibilities?

Elsewhere, in the ‘Emergence’ images, zigzagging striations speed towards and erupt at their own edges – displaced energies redolent of ripple sand patterns created by wind or water.

The elemental energies expressed in the ‘Breath’ and ‘Emergence’ works reoccur in ‘Moment’ # I - III (2011). While the title notes a single measurement, the radian-like marks suggest something else.

sequence No. 5 [four images] ‘Breath’ Series #II, #III (2011). Monoprints, 80 x 130cm.

‘Breath’ Series #IV, #V (2011). Monoprints, 100 x 75cms.

INSERT IMAGE sequence No. 6 [three images] ‘Moment’ Series (2011) #I, #II, #IV. Monoprints, 100 x 80cms.

In physics, the term ‘moment’ (or moment of force) refers to the tendency of a force to twist or rotate an object. The ‘Moment’ sequence does not describe an object. But the distribution of angular displacements in these spheres conjures momentum; perhaps a series of developments, or a critical turning point on which much depends? These intensely blue, unidirectional orchestrations, like equations of motion, suggest more than a point in time.

And while there is no identifiable object, there is gesture, a veritable kinesic, evincing movement in time.

INSERT IMAGE sequence No. 7 [four images] ‘Emergence’ (2011), #XI, 80 x 57cms; #VIII, #IX, #X. Monoprints 100 x 80cms.

“We live in a dimensional universe in which the only constant is change. Yet many of our actions suggest we view life as linear, here and now, with no after effects. However, as the French singer Bénebar says in his song ‘L’effet papillon’, the beating wings of a butterfly somewhere to Cambodia can add to the havoc occurring on another continent. We have to recognise that even the smallest of movements forms part of larger energies.”

Peren does not use her art to remonstrate with us about our impact upon the environment. Rather, like Bénebar, her gestural works conjure motion and offer us imaginative entry points into wider considerations.

‘Light Lands’ series (2009-10). Four from a photographic sequence of 360, x cms.

I 80 x 120mm

I I 80 x 120mm

I I I 70 x 80mm

IV 70 x 80mm

1V

V 70 x 80mm

VI 70 x 80mm

sequence No. 9 [eleven images] ‘Illuminations’ series #I – VI (2011). Monoprints

Surrounded as we are by nature, it’s important to step back and consider our actions and their consequences. For me, the mind is an ecosystem. It is clear that our environmental policies worldwide are failing, largely because there appears to be a vacuum of thought.

Many of our actions appear to be dominated with no greater incentive than individual or national profit. It is now more urgent than ever that we consider our eco-system, what it offers, and our place within it. This was a primary intuition behind ‘Illuminations’ # I and II (2011) and the ‘Light Lands’ (2009-10) works.”

Despite the change in medium, the C-print ‘Light Lands’ (200910) clearly continue Peren’s enquiries. These 360 images conjure landscapes of long horizons, rainbows and waterfalls. En masse many read like meteorological phenomena: wind, rain, hail, lightning, tornadoes and hurricanes. Yet equally, they might be quivering fault lines, prised open by unseen energies. Or they might be apocalyptic vistas swept by the fiery skeins; or energy transformations brought about by solar energy on the planet’s atmosphere’ or acres wrapped in barbed wire. Highly evocative, they recall Peren’s mesmeric use of light in Papakura and the ‘Illuminations’ prints and sculptures.

The ‘Illuminations’ prints, vortices overlaid with luminous paint, are

other energy transformations, intensely gestural, even chaotic, as though the artist has relinquished control. Yet whether evocations of utter spontaneity, or the accidental, such marks do not mask the intensities involved – like beams of light and radio waves sweeping across the sky. In the dark, do the luminous arcing overlays allude to reflection nebulae or constellations already spent? Is this visual turmoil part of this artist’s communication – that our actions and energies are out of control?

INSERT IMAGE No. 10 [sculpture] ‘Hubble’ series #I (2011). Polyester resin, 30 x 36cm.

INSERT IMAGE No. 11 [sculpture] ‘Hubble’ series #V (2012). Polyester resin 30 x 32cms.

… now the shadows Speaking about the sculptures, Peren commented, “On our farm in Central Otago, I recently shifted a large quantity of earth mechanically in order to create a sheltered side to our hill-top home. Nothing appeared to grow on the mound. Then a large, solitary fungus appeared. As it matured, it burst open, as beautiful as a magnolia flower, but highly poisonous. The displacement of the soil and the emergence of the fungus set me thinking about displacements within the environment and the consequences.

This was the stimulus behind these sculptures.”

Submerge

“Questions are my subject matter, turned to critique our knowledge and use of the world (Peren)”

“I do not consider art as pure creation since it starts with the stimuli of our world, filtered through perception which in itself is inflected with experience. Like any artist, knowledge of the past and present and lived experience informs my work; and the recognition that all knowledge is partial; incomplete. This is all the more reason for us to strive towards the light, and to make the necessary connections between the light and the dark; the shadows.

“The correspondence between stimuli (that which we perceive and understand) and a finished work, is the product of this interface, plus contemplative energies and response. I believe that art, by design or default, can reflect on and illuminate human endeavour. It can serve as a powerful mirror of our world and our conduct within this.

“I print and sculpt to question and communicate, always conscious that even our best efforts are limited, requiring a sort of continuous critical engagement since all knowledge and communication involves interpretation.

“Life is neither a passive, nor a primrose path. And while much modern technology is astounding and often benign, it’s only one facet of ‘light’, one aid towards understanding. I believe enquiry and communication offer avenues for selfexamination and can lead towards sustainable possibilities and practices.

Faced with the magnitude of our world ecological crisis, individual effort may appear insignificant, almost powerless. But communities can create a will to change. In this regard, the print is an ideal tool.

“Like a poster or a photocopied notice, the print reproduces an entity and through replication destroys notions of singularity and uniqueness. And within this democracy lies possibilities of renewal.

The print exudes un-fixedness and is an ideal medium for communicating and posing questions.

And the monoprints, in particular, facilitates my expressive approach.”

Takiri te Ata [the banishing of darkness] Peren’s works offer a conjunction of heightened sensitivity and artistic objectivity in expressions of deeply felt concerns. The ‘Illuminations’ prints exude quick and intuitive marks. Some undulate harmoniously, others appear frenetic. Yet, paradoxically, each contains a modicum of calm.

Irrespective of titles, there is no identifiable object, only expressive energies. These same energies have fashioned the prismatic ‘Illuminations’ sculptures and suggest that Peren can move fluidly and effectively between dimensions in her explorations concerning the influence of motion.

All of these works are the product of considerable energy, reflecting upon the impact of any ‘footprint’ upon the environment. While representation and control appear to play a peripheral role, Peren’s expressive energies light up these works, technically rough and polished, simple and sophisticated.

Peren’s is a maieutic enquiry. Whether in sculptures or in prints, it consistently aims to bring into the light, into clear consciousness, the importance and indivisible integrity of the environment. The environment, she insists, in not simply a source to nourish and sustain cultures and communities, but an irreplaceable body ‒ of land, light and water.

Cassandra Fusco

Catalogue designed by Maurice Lye lye@paradise.net.nz. and printed

by Otago Polytechnic Te Kura Matatini ki Otago. Essay by Dr. Cassandra Fusco, NZ contributing editor for: World Sculpture News (HK), Craft Arts International (Sydney) and Asian Art News (HK).