RETURN TO THE CITY | Russ Giles | 7-18 Oct 25

The transition of location after many year up north Russ Giles artistic curiosity to town living formed this latest series of work....

"The works in this exhibition were initiated on our return to live in Uptown Grafton July 2023, having lived in Kerikeri in the Bay of Islands for 16 years.  From ground level garden living to apartment clifftop dwelling in the city. This new work began with photographic observations of the continually changing roadside survey utility markings,( I engaged with one of these unrecognised sign writers for a morning} the proliferation of orange cones, the significant buildings and places of interest and the ever present black backed gulls I watched as they set up their dwelling places on the rooftops provided a scenario real or imagined which paralleled our own and became the narrative to weave into this newly discovered cityscape.

These real and imagined narratives are presented in constructed triptych formats and installations, using a variety of mixed media, carved and textured surfaces. The triptychs create the individual spaces for a comic serial narrative. Construction, Media and painting techniques alternate between imitation of real surfaces and computer manipulated digital imagery. As the works moved into 2024/5 they developed a pronounced ‘Post Pop’ genre, particularly the ‘Out on the Street’ installation various ‘traffic cone’ works.