Pencil Case Painters, February 2024

Programme

Wellington Launch Event Wednesday 14

February

6pm — 8pm

Thursday 15 — Friday 16

February

10am — 5pm

Saturday 17

February

11am — 3pm

Viewing

Auckland Launch Event Tuesday 20

February

6pm — 8pm

Wednesday 21 — Friday 23

February

10am — 5pm

Saturday 24 — Sunday 25

February

10am — 4pm

Monday 26

February

10am — 5pm

Pencil Case Painters

Auction

Viewing

Viewing on Request

Monday 26 February

6.30pm

Select Auction Monday 26 February

7.30pm

Intellectual Rock 'n' Roll

by Lucinda Bennett

We have all heard of artists Shane Cotton, Bill Hammond, Séraphine Pick, Tony de Lautour, Peter Robinson and Saskia Leek. Often known as the Pencil Case Painters, they are that motley group of Ilam graduates whose paintings – especially from the 1990s – are characterised by a provisional, doodle-like quality. But where did this moniker originate? I had assumed this question would be easily answered, given how widely the term is used within art circles, but written instances of its use are mostly colloquial, slotted into sentences with an air of presumption, no reference given. When I ask around, I am told it was surely coined by curator Lara Strongman, so I follow the thread.

In 1995, Strongman – then curator at the Waikato Museum of Art and History – and Robert Leonard curated a grungy touring exhibition titled Hangover, featuring eleven artists from across the country, all united by their unironic fascination with trash culture. Included in this number were four of the painters we now know as pencil casers: Bill Hammond, Tony de Lautour, Peter Robinson and Saskia Leek.

It was in the catalogue for this exhibition that the term ‘Pencil Case Art’ was first put into writing, not by Strongman but by Gwynneth Porter, who brought it up in an interview with painter Tony de Lautour:

Given Porter was probably commissioned

by Strongman to interview de Lautour, so it seems likely Porter would quote her, although the phrasing suggests the descriptor was given to de Lautour’s work alone. How, then, did the moniker come to be associated with not one but six (or more, depending who you talk to) artists?

A few years after Hangover, in 1998, curator Elizabeth Caldwell brought together a group of Christchurch artists for the exhibition Skywriters and Earthmovers at the McDougall Contemporary Art Annex (now Christchurch Art Gallery Te Puna o Waiwhetū). In her catalogue essay, Caldwell describes the long tradition of painters coming out of Christchurch, citing the pioneering modernist collective The Group – who formed in 1927 and exhibited together for 50 years – as a forerunner to this new circle of Canterbury-trained postmodern artists: Shane Cotton, Bill Hammond, Tony de Lautour, Séraphine Pick, Peter Robinson, Chris Heaphy and Grant Takle.2 It is here that we see our central grouping of artists exhibited

I’ve heard your work described as Pencil Case Art, like you paint something for the same reason someone would put it on a pencil case.

Pencil Case Art. I like that. That’s what I really like about some art – it just had to be done. Painting is like intellectual rock’n’roll.

What do you mean?

I’m not entirely sure.1

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together – again, in the case of Hammond, de Lautour and Robinson – although this time missing Saskia Leek.

As the diversity of works included in this auction attests, there is no single mode or influence shared by the Pencil Case Painters. Their association is instead attributed to various stylistic and thematic similarities discernible despite each artist possessing their own distinct signature styles and realms of interest. Themes of national identity and pop culture persist across the group, as do graffiti-esque scrawls of text emphasising the surface of a painting, and flat, monochromatic backdrops populated by floating, often personal, idiosyncratic emblems. Alternately, when three-dimensional space is represented by these painters, there is often, as Caldwell describes, “an air of theatricality and the objects in this alien environment are presented as though on a vast and indefinable stage.”3 This theatricality can be sensed in Pick’s Two Spheres, in which a naked woman lies on her side in the murky green foreground, arms reaching between her legs, mouth widened in a cry. Ominous flowers bloom bloodred around her body while elsewhere in the landscape, nothing grows. The only other forms to break the smoothness of this eerie place are two featureless lumps that seem to sit atop the ground, their mottled surfaces a shade of green pitched perfectly between the turquoisestreaked sky and the dark, kelp-coloured ground.

Gwynneth Porter and Tony de ◇ Lautour, “Takes One to Know One: 1

Gwynneth Porter Talks to Tony de Lautour,” in Hangover, 1995–1996: An Exhibition, ed. Robert Leonard, Lara Strongman and Priscilla Pitts (Dunedin Public Art Gallery, 1995), 24.

↘

2

Elizabeth Caldwell, Skywriters and Earthmovers (Christchurch: Robert McDougall Art Gallery and Annex, 1998), 1.

● Ibid.

Hay, “Jingle Jangle Morning,” □ Jinennifer Bill Hammond: Jingle Jangle 3

4

Morning (Christchurch Art Gallery Te Puna o Waiwhetū, 2007), 38–39.

Although distinct in subject matter, this painting of Pick’s echoes the uneasy blue and green washes that became a hallmark of Hammond’s practice, inspired by the bold but limited colour palettes seen in Ukiyo-e (1680–68) or ‘floating world’ images from Japan’s Edo period.

In Hammond’s diamond-shaped Ancestral L (2005), we see the influence not only of Japanese woodblock prints, but also tā moko in the finely etched fern patterns that adorn the figure’s face, as well as Renaissance portraits of nobility, such such as Piero della Francesca’s Duke and Duchess of Urbino (c. 1465–72), in which the subjects are painted in profile, recalling Roman coins.4 De Lautour is similarly interested in the symbolic potential of our native flora and fauna; his untitled painting from 1994–97 features the kiwi, but not as we usually see him.

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By de Lautour’s hand, our national bird is corrupted, as Robert Leonard writes, cast against type and offered as “drooling, demented and degenerate”, transformed into a gleefully stampeding Godzilla.5 Reappearing in lot 54, de Lautour’s redfaced kiwi is now placed at the centre of what appears to be a selection of tattoo flash art, surrounded by various motifs inspired by gang insignia. It is exactly the kind of silly stuff kids still doodle on their pencil cases and folders, the kind of art that is made spontaneously but laden with references reflecting the artist’s deep-seated interests.

telescopic rifle sight: the fine tweaking of crosshairs and range-finding dots as the hunter takes aim at a distant target.”6 Cotton has also talked about his circle motif as referencing gang patches, not just for the complex space they occupy in New Zealand society, but also for the way they come “out of carving … and the prominence of the eye in the manaia ...

I had this idea that the painting should have a big eye that looks back at you.”7

I have been trying to figure out what de Lautour might have meant when he said painting is like “intellectual rock’n’roll”, and I think this web of references unspooling Like de Lautour’s, Cotton’s practice has from a single symbol being used over and long involved utilising various symbols over again (in many different ways, over associated with the history of Aotearoa. many years) may be a perfect example.8 In his sepia-toned works from the 1990s – A classic modern motif, the concentric such as Middle North (1994) and untitled circles hit at an aesthetic level, rings (c1990s) – he employed motifs from the of dense colour humming against one colonial period, such as flags, ships, waka, another, but they are always swirling out potted plants, wooden structures and of history, speaking across space and symbols associated with Māori resistance. time, speaking to other works of art, other It wasn’t until the mid-2000s that Cotton circle forms in Cotton’s own oeuvre, in began working with the concentric-circle the oeuvres of artists he has met and motif we see in Two Streams (2017), artists he hasn’t, always in conversation initially floating these bullseye targetwith the world outside of the painting. shapes atop black grounds alongside other haunting symbols, such as dead native birds and glowing blue toi moko (tattooed and severed Māori heads). At this scale and in attractive shades of sky blue and fuchsia, Cotton’s chromatic obert Leonard, “Valley of DB,” in ♥ RHangover, circles bear more resemblance to Jasper 1995–1996: An Exhibition, 7.

Johns’ targets, Julian Dashper’s drumJ

ustin Paton, “Speaking Sticks ○ and Moving Targets,” skin abstracts and Ralph Hōtere’s black 171 (2013), https://christchurchartgallery. circles. However, look closer and you will org.nz/bulletin/171/speakingnotice Cotton’s targets are peppered with sticks-moving-targets strips and dots of colour. These could Shane Cotton quoted in Anthony ↗ Byrt, be viewed as formalist devices used to This Model World: Travels to the Edge of Contemporary Art lead our eyes around the painting, but, (Auckland University Press, 2016), 59. as curator Justin Paton points out, “they orter and de Lautour, “Takes ◆ POne also evoke the terrible abstraction of a to Know One,” 24.

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1 Bill Hammond, Giant Eagle 2006 lithograph on paper, 8/24 signed, dated and title inscribed 155 × 950mm EST $3,000 — $6,000

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2 Bill Hammond, untitled 2006 lithograph on paper, edition of 100 585 × 430mm EST $9,000 — $12,000

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3 Séraphine Pick, untitled watercolour on paper signed 300 × 210mm EST $1,500 — $2,500

4 Peter Robinson, untitled 2004 lithograph on paper, 8/24 signed and dated 320 × 220mm EST $1,000 — $2,000

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5 Bill Hammond, Fish Finder 4 2004 etching on paper, 8/24 signed, dated and title inscribed 410 × 290mm EST $6,500 — $8,500

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6 Tony de Lautour, untitled oil on board 155 × 100mm EST $1,000 — $2,000

7 Tony de Lautour, untitled oil on board 100 × 115mm EST $1,000 — $2,000

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8 Tony de Lautour, untitled 1998 oil on board signed and dated 100 × 155mm (each panel) EST $900 — $1,400

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9 Séraphine Pick, untitled 1995 acrylic on card signed and dated 135 × 375mm EST $4,000 — $8,000

10 Séraphine Pick, untitled 2013 acrylic on canvas signed and dated 400 × 500mm EST $10,000 — $15,000

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11 Séraphine Pick, untitled 2010 oil on linen signed and dated 400 × 300mm EST $12,000 — $18,000

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12 Bill Hammond, untitled 1982 lithograph on paper signed and dated 420 × 280mm EST $2,500 — $5,000

13 Bill Hammond, untitled 1982 lithograph on paper signed and dated 375 × 255mm EST $2,500 — $5,000

14 Bill Hammond, untitled 1982 lithograph on paper signed and dated 425 × 275mm EST $2,500 — $5,000

15 Bill Hammond, untitled 1981 lithograph on paper signed and dated 370 × 250mm EST $2,500 — $5,000

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16 Bill Hammond, untitled 1982 lithograph on paper signed and dated 315 × 295mm EST $2,500 — $5,000

17 Bill Hammond, untitled 1982 lithograph on paper signed and dated 340 × 265mm EST $2,500 — $5,000

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18 Tony de Lautour, untitled (Head) 2003 acrylic on paper signed and dated 275 × 375mm EST $3,500 — $7,000

19 Tony de Lautour, Plan with Heads 2006 acrylic on card signed, dated and title inscribed 500 × 220mm EST $1,500 — $2,500

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Tony de Lautour stands as a prominent figure in the contemporary art scene of New Zealand, renowned for his low-brow, high-art approach to artistic expression.

Born in Melbourne in 1965 and arriving in this country in 1967, de Lautour transcends traditional boundaries, incorporating diverse mediums and styles, making him a true pioneer in the realm of New Zealand art.

De Lautour’s artistic journey began in earnest during his formative years, as he showed an early aptitude for creativity and a deep curiosity about the world around him. In the late 1980s, he pursued his formal education at the School of Fine Arts at the University of Canterbury in Christchurch, where he honed his skills and developed a strong foundation in traditional artistic techniques. This educational background laid the groundwork for the eclectic and boundary-pushing style that defines de Lautour’s oeuvre.

One of de Lautour’s notable contributions to New Zealand art is his exploration of the juxtaposition between high and low culture. He seamlessly weaves together references to art history, contemporary urban life and popular culture, challenging conventional notions of artistic categorisation. An example of this is found in the monumental Island (2000), part of a wider series titled Logo. A Nike ‘swoosh’ is planted in a sea of black, de Lautour’s painted geographies adorning the shape. The deliberate juxtaposition of a globally recognised corporate symbol with a painted landscape resembling the Southern Alps serves as a commentary on the pervasive influence of multinational corporations on the local and global environment.

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20 Tony de Lautour, Lion Rock 2003 acrylic on paper signed, dated and title inscribed 240 × 330mm EST $1,000 — $2,000

21 Tony de Lautour, Say Less 2004 acrylic on paper signed and dated 400 × 500mm EST $4,000 — $6,000

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This amalgamation of high-art landscapes with lowbrow branding underscores de Lautour’s commitment to exploring the intersections between the sacred and the profane, challenging viewers to contemplate the implications of such juxtapositions. It creates a tension that transcends the canvas, prompting viewers to confront the impact of consumer culture on the natural world and consider the implications of branding on the collective identity of a nation.

Furthermore, de Lautour’s approach to style extends beyond individual pieces, shaping his broader body of work. His eclectic use of mediums, from traditional painting techniques to graffitiinspired elements, reflects a commitment to pushing artistic boundaries. This can be seen in a number of works featured in this catalogue: paintings adorned with heraldic lions, speech bubbles and varying motifs. We see de Lautour's repetition of symbols in Say Less (2004) with a reappearance of the Nike logo.

22 Tony de Lautour, untitled 2005 acrylic on paper signed and dated 400 × 500mm EST $2,000 — $4,000

De Lautour's innovative blend not only challenges the traditional dichotomy between high and low culture, but also contributes to the evolution of New Zealand’s contemporary art scene.

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23 Shane Cotton, untitled 1992 oil on canvas signed and dated 300 × 410mm EST $5,000 — $10,000

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24 Shane Cotton, untitled c1990s oil on canvas signed 305 × 615mm EST $12,000 — $22,000

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25 Tony de Lautour, Looking for Books 1999 oil on board signed and dated 225 × 305mm EST $4,000 — $8,000

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EST

Bill Hammond, Heads and Hands 1988 graphite on paper signed, dated and title inscribed 210 × 350mm $5,000 — $8,000

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27 Séraphine Pick, untitled 2000 oil on canvas signed and dated 400 × 500mm EST $8,000 — $12,000

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Séraphine Pick rose to prominence during the 1990s as “a painter best known for depicting the life of the female mind.”1 While Pick’s surreal and fantastic scenes of bodies and objects have evolved visually, the world of the human, and in particular the female, subconscious continues to be an infinite source of thematic exploration.

Pick is one of a group of artists whose style is referred to as pencil case art; as a group they are known as the Pencil Case Painters, and include Bill Hammond, Saskia Leek, Tony de Lautour, Shane Cotton and Peter Robinson. The artists’ shared sensibility seems to rebel against their ‘fine’ art training in favour of ‘low’ art forms, such as cartooning, graffiti, doodling and folk art. The result is a creative process in which compositions arise by way of spontaneous psychic flow from brain to surface.

Pick’s parents both attended art school, and she “grew up surrounded by influential New Zealand artists including Tony Fomison and Peter Peryer.”2 Pick vividly remembers her father showing her Francisco Goya’s Saturn Devouring His Son (1819–23) as a child, and the morbidly comic artwork made a lasting impact, remaining lodged at the forefront of 25

her creative lobe. In an interview with curator and art historian Megan Dunn, Pick speaks of the significance of Paul Gauguin’s 1898 painting The White Horse, of which she had a reproduction print on her bedroom wall.3 Pick was fascinated by the contradiction between the painting’s title and Gauguin’s composition, in which, perversely, the horse in the foreground is green, and a second horse is red. The artwork’s air of mystery and strangeness resonated with Pick’s own imagination; art was a doorway into a world in which “there are no rules.”4 The four untitled artworks offered in this catalogue characterise her practice during the Pencil Case Painters time. Notice the pronounced outline of figures and objects, and the drawn quality of the paint – scratchy and feathery.

The treatment of features such as flowers, water drips and flowing liquid is decorative, like that of wallpaper and folkart patterning, while space is suggested rather than rendered.

Pick’s later compositions are highly detailed and technically deft; her subject matter emerges from atmospheric fields of murky washes of pigment, paint drips and wispy paint marks; bodies appear suspended between flickering planes of existence.

Figures appear fluid, as limbs blur into amorphous environments, in which space is suggested rather than clearly described. When bodies are rendered fully formed, they are technically magnificent beings, vividly articulated by the artist’s dexterous hand.

While her early subject matter is explicitly personal, her later work draws on culture at large. What was dreamy is now psychedelic. Past, present and future; at the heart of Pick’s work is a converging of universal human fears and desires.

 1 Megan Dunn, Silence or Sound in Séraphine Pick: White Noise, ed.

Courtney Johnston (Wellington: The Dowse Art Museum), 22.

● Ibid, 23. △ Ibid. ↖ Ibid.

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28 Séraphine Pick, Two Spheres 2001 oil on canvas signed and dated 355 × 460mm EST $7,000 — $10,000

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29 Saskia Leek, From the Colour Course 2013 oil on board signed and dated 410 × 320mm EST $5,000 — $8,000

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Saskia Leek is a Christchurch-born, Dunedin-based painter who has exhibited widely. While her style has significantly evolved visually, Leek’s strong use of colour, domestic scale and fascination with the everyday remain central elements of her unique visual language.

In Leek’s paintings of the 1990s, she presents quirky figurative scenes that appear to be almost diaristic – seemingly taken from the artist’s personal life, or her imagination.

These early works frequently feature speech and thought bubbles, or speech text as a kind of narrative device within the painting. Populating these works are people and personified objects, cartoonish in their effect. Pick’s treatment of figures in these works has a naive quality – simply described forms, outlined in black, and depicted within a bright, flat colour-field rather than a referential background. Tones of acid green, dark maroon, blood red, bubble-gum pink and bright or baby blue are the artist’s preferred palette. These 90s artworks quintessentially encapsulate the Pencil Case Painters style.

In the 2000s, Leek’s work evolved to another version of dreamlike – this time dreamy in terms of paint treatment as well as subject matter. Paintings from this time document everyday subject matter – houses, birds, bananas – alongside more fanciful images, such as unicorns and leaping dolphins. Leek has been known to use ready-made images from artworks found in second-hand shops as starting points for some of her works, which is perhaps the case here. These works are characterised by their pastel-coloured palette and are usually very softly rendered – further emphasising their dreaminess.

Leek’s current practice has moved beyond the figurative, with a focus on the formal components of painting – colour and form – as we see in From the Colour Course (2013), featured in this catalogue.

Leek’s shift from stylised representation to pure abstraction would appear to have strong influences of Cubism. From the Colour Course presents a sky-blue rectangle near the centre of the image, with a variety of blue-and-white-toned shapes surrounding it, punctuated by a few translucent, deep-red geometric shapes. A more muted, periwinkle blue wiggles its way around the edge, creating a border in a way that holds the shapes in a kind of embrace that unifies the image.

While these icy-coloured shapes and forms are geometric, with many hard lines, the image still feels harmonious and soft. There are overlapping washy

areas within the colours, and imperfect edges on the shapes, showcasing the hand of the artist. Many of these later works also utilise the physical frame of the painting in a new way, by extending the main painted image – making the viewer more conscious that they are looking at a physical painted object that has been carefully created by the artist.

This consideration of the painted object has always been present in Leek’s work – like the other artists’ work featured here, rejecting any kind of pursuit of representing reality.

Throughout her practice, her paintings have usually been small in size, most no larger than A3. With this small scale comes a sense of intimacy – of looking inside Leek’s world, peering inside her brain to see what candy-coloured concoction she has dreamed up for us.

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Séraphine Pick, untitled 2004 graphite on paper signed and dated 550 × 715mm $5,000 — $8,000

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31 Séraphine Pick, untitled 1997 watercolour on paper signed and dated 290 × 210mm EST $2,000 — $3,000 32 Séraphine Pick, untitled 2005 oil on linen signed and dated 610 × 510mm EST $8,000 — $12,000

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33 Bill Hammond, untitled 1981 ink on paper signed and dated 210 × 410mm EST $6,000 — $10,000

34 Bill Hammond, untitled 1989 watercolour on paper signed and dated 405 × 285mm EST $6,000 — $10,000

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35 Bill Hammond, Study 1998 ink on paper signed, dated and title inscribed 750 × 540mm EST $12,000 — $18,000

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36 Peter Robinson, untitled 1998 ink on canvas signed and dated 1500 × 117mm EST $20,000 — $30,000

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Peter Robinson, an artist known for his political yet humorous work, first emerged on the art scene in 1985, when he studied sculpture at Ilam School of Fine Arts in Christchurch. Since then, his career has evolved across a diverse range of mediums, encompassing sculpture, drawing and painting. While Robinson now has a predominantly sculptural practice, he first rose to fame for his politically charged paintings that used text and iconography to challenge local bicultural debates of ethnicity, identity and authenticity, as seen in the works offered by Webb’s.

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The two paintings on paper featured are also classic examples of Robinson’s commentary on ethnicity, identity and cultural value, often in regard to his own Māori heritage. Works such as Say “Mouldy” Like in Cheese and the Percentage paintings are perfect examples of how Robinson pared these works down to their political yet still playful essence. Crudely painted, usually in black, white and red, the bold works carry simple tongue-in-cheek statements, not dissimilar to DIY protest posters or bathroom graffiti.

The work Evil Doer! (2002), with its iconic use of the thumbs-up symbol and bold use of text, is referential to classic pop-art styles, signalling reverence for the equally renowned Aotearoabased painter Dick Frizzell. This is noteworthy, as both Robinson and Frizzell concern themselves and their work with conversations relating to biculturalism in Aotearoa. Through the use and subversion of iconic symbols, both artists bring a fresh approach to unpacking contemporary topical cultural and political discussion.

37 Peter Robinson, Evil Doer!

2002 acrylic and oil stick on paper signed and dated 1390 × 990mm EST $25,000 — $35,000

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In the two untitled works we see a series of political sentiments reminiscent of opinions heard at a pub or on talkback radio inscribed in oil stick on a large piece of paper. Featured at the centre of the scribbled statements is a list of people’s names, which the artist has titled “BAD INFLUENCES + HIGHER BEINGS” – the names are those of famous ‘bad-boy’ visual and music artists, a cheeky nod to the artist’s own influences, and perhaps to the notion that he could ‘go too far’.

Examining Robinson’s work at scale, it’s impossible to overlook the striking contribution he makes to a collection or, more broadly, to the ever-expanding visual landscape of Aotearoa. He has the ability to seamlessly blend humour, political commentary and cultural reflection to create work that intrigues and challenges Aotearoa’s art audience.

38 Peter Robinson, untitled c2002 acrylic and oilstick on paper 1670 × 1250mm EST $35,000 — $45,000

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Shane Cotton’s first manifestations of large-scale roundels or targets took the form of monumental monoprints created during his residency in 2009 at the Gottesman Etching Center in Israel. When Justin Paton first encountered these roundel works in Brisbane, as part of Cotton’s exhibition The Hanging Sky, he described them as recalling abstract art at its most meditative and centred … Comparisons jumped immediately to mind: Kenneth Noland’s swirling circles, Jasper Johns’s targets, and Julian Dashper’s drum-skin abstracts (one of which hangs in Cotton’s home) …

Those dots and strips of colour may be formalist devices, the kind of thing commonly used by abstract painters to ‘tune’ a larger field of paint. But they also evoke the terrible abstraction of a telescopic rifle sight: the fine tweaking of crosshairs and range-finding dots as the hunter takes aim at a distant target.

Such an analogy instantly puts us in the troubling role of hunters or marksmen … in an art galleryturned-shooting gallery. The stronger echo, however, given the various colours of this series of works, is of air force roundels, the coloured abstract circles that national defence forces paint on the sides of their planes. Sometimes featuring national symbols designed for long-distance legibility – a kiwi for New Zealand, for instance – these roundels were originally designed to stop gun crews on the ground from accidentally shooting down planes on their own side.1

Justin Paton, “Finding Space: Six ● Encounters with Shane Cotton,” 1

in Shane Cotton: The Hanging Sky (Christchurch Art Gallery Te Puna o Waiwhetū, 2013), 46–47.

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39 Shane Cotton, Two Streams 2017 acrylic on board signed, dated and title inscribed 1800mm (diameter) EST $120,000 — $180,000

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In addition to dramatically As Paton points out: realigning the tone and tensions One can start by looking for of Cotton’s pictorial vocabulary, family ties amongst these his ground-breaking works in objects, focusing, perhaps, The Hanging Sky exhibition on the vanitas qualities of the ingeniously represented Aotearoa’s birds … each one associated in hybrid culture. After this, Cotton some way with the brevity and notably decamped from painting fragility of life. But the visual stacked-up walls of iconography effect of the painting works and landscapes in favour of fiercely against this connectpainting vast vaults of sky, and his the-dots approach. Painted palette shifted from earth tones with great surety in a palette of to rich blacks, blues and reds. pinks, greys and clarion blues, Painted four years after Cotton’s the target seems to sit right first monumental roundels up on the painting’s surface; exhibited in The Hanging Sky, it doesn’t recede or open up Two Streams (2017) is a large atmospherically. So when target on which he’s floated an Cotton drops modelled forms intriguing collection of images: in front of it, they pop out from three seemingly native birds, the flatness aggressively – like of which one is obviously a separate sounds bouncing tūī, a topographical fragment into the room off the visual of landscape, and various equivalent of a kick-drum.2 cryptic cyphers that float While Cotton’s practice has often among more conventional explored place, his Māori heritage abstract dots and dashes. and other stories that ground themselves within Aotearoa art, in the target paintings he seems to unground his iconography.

Here, by floating the images on a target, Cotton sets them free from preconceived ideas.

 Ibid.

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In Bill Hammond’s painting Ancestral L (2005), the artist presents us with an ancient anthropomorphic world depicted within the geometric form of the diamond, a shape that holds many different meanings and associations. In sacred geometry the diamond is said to represent a transcendental journey to higher understanding, with the four points symbolising peaks of intellectual knowledge. Another belief is that the diamond holds invincible spiritual powers.

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It is interesting to note, then, that Theia, the goddess associated with diamonds in Greek mythology, was also responsible for bestowing gold, silver, precious metals and gemstones with radiance. With this in mind, we could surmise that Hammond is referencing Theia through the use of the glowing pearlescent gold paint that emanates from beneath the aqueous green surface, and that the central ormithological figure presents as an oracular being.

The birds in Hammond’s paintings are widely perceived as creatures waiting pensively for some portentous future event. Theia was an oracular goddess who shared stories of visions through her prophecies, and the central figure in Ancestral L, a large head, certainly gives us the impression that something has happened, or is about to happen.

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40 Bill Hammond, Ancestral L 2005 acrylic on canvas signed, dated and title inscribed 600 × 600mm EST $100,000 — $150,000

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This painting shows restraint, and a compositional balance that hinges on the few and harmonious elements. It shows a place that is still untouched by humans.

In this work the birds are There are no trees or obvious tilting and teetering on the physical features indicating half-human head as if their land; perhaps Hammond is very next move or future relies describing a place before on what happens next. On earthly time, or is it a future in the head, a bird is balanced which all has disappeared? upside down, almost like a ceremonial headdress, while Hammond’s work reminds us of that precious state of a second bird is precariously balance between the natural linked by a thread and leans world and those that inhabit into the wind, as a third it, and the potential state of bird appears nonchalant – harmony when birds and turning their gaze away from humans become one. the inevitable outcome.

From the back of the head, four other birds are emerging like thick tendrils of hair, as if they are growing out of the flora that almost entirely cloaks the head. The fern motifs could be read as tattoos and be seen to inextricably link man and nature.

The rich embellishment covering the head gives the impression that it, too, is emerging from the bush.

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41 Tony de Lautour, Island 2000 oil on canvas 1400 × 2800mm EST $30,000 — $50,000

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42 Séraphine Pick, untitled 2017 watercolour on paper signed and dated 250 × 190mm EST $4,000 — $8,000

43 Séraphine Pick, And Be With You (study) 2009 watercolour on paper signed and dated 280 × 550mm EST $10,000 — $13,000

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44 Tony de Lautour, Head 2007 woodcut on paper, 23/25 signed, dated and title inscribed 420 × 300mm EST $1,200 — $2,200

45 Tony de Lautour, Firewater 1993 etching on paper, 1/10 signed and dated 285 × 250mm EST $1,000 — $2,000

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46 Tony de Lautour, untitled c1990s oil on found book 190 × 130 × 20mm (widest points) EST $1,200 — $1,600

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47 Bill Hammond, untitled wood, acrylic and metal 1270 × 175 × 200mm (widest points) EST $3,000 — $5,000

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48 Bill Hammond, untitled wood 290 × 485 × 130mm (widest points) EST $2,000 — $3,000

49 Bill Hammond, untitled wood and metal 80 × 270 × 280mm (widest points) EST $1,800 — $2,500

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50 Tony de Lautour, Hot Lick 1992 oil, varnish, and paper on canvas signed, dated and title inscribed 130 × 200mm EST $1,000 — $2,000

51 Tony de Lautour, Hot Lick 3 1993 oil on canvas signed, dated and title inscribed 135 × 200mm EST $1,500 — $3,000

52 Tony de Lautour, untitled 1994 oil on canvas signed and dated 135 × 200mm EST $1,500 — $3,000

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53 Tony de Lautour, untitled 1994-97 oil on canvas signed and dated 135 × 200mm EST $1,000 — $2,000

54 Tony de Lautour, untitled 1994-95 oil on board signed and dated 225 × 500mm EST $2,000 — $4,000

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55 Peter Robinson, untitled C-type prints 935 × 975mm EST $1,200 — $2,000

56 Shane Cotton, Middle North 1997 screenprint on paper, 25/28 signed, dated and title inscribed 525 × 755mm EST $1,000 — $2,000

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