Nau mai, haere mai, welcome to EyeContact. You are invited to respond to reviews and contribute to discussion by registering to participate.

JH

Granular Cityscapes

AA
View Discussion
Gary McMillan, Scene 37, 2018, acrylic on linen (framed), 45 x 60 cm Gary McMillan, Scene 38, 2018, acrylic on linen (framed), 63 x 84 cm Gary McMillan, Scene 39, 2018, acrylic on linen (framed), 45 x 60 cm Gary McMillan: Scene 31, 2018, acrylic on board (framed),  30 x 40 cm; Scene 30, 2018, acrylic on board (framed), 30 x 40 cm Gary McMillan, Scene 34, 2018, acrylic on board, (framed), 43.5 x 58 cm Gary McMillan, Scene 35, 2018,  acrylic on linen, (framed), 63 x 84 cm

Even though they allude to post-impressionism, McMillan likes to play with out of focus forms, hot incandescent flares, truncated rectangles and wrinkled dribbly picture planes. These deliberately vague works make interesting objects that are untypical of paintings. Non digital, alluding to science fiction and future time—and subtly ominous— some reference looking out of speeding cars through rain-drenched windscreens.

Auckland

 

Gary McMillan
Phase IV

 

23 August - 22 September 2018

Almost without exception, everybody loves the paintings of Georges Seurat, and while to allude to him is sort of obvious and a little bit corny-maybe even crass—the ‘pointillist’ cityscape paintings by Gary McMillan currently being presented at Fox Jensen McCory are so beautifully executed you can’t help but be drawn in. Their delicate blurry haze is captivating—but not in your face—and from a distance, they are easy to mistake for photographs. They have a greyness that makes you think you are looking at emulsion on paper. Until you get close.

This perfection of execution-the intriguing surface— is reminiscent of Australian Papunya paintings, but made with a fine brush of about a millimetre thickness, and not with cotton buds. The ‘pointillism’ is like a generous scattering of hundreds and thousands, but without an optical mixing of primaries. The varied tertiary and secondary hues within McMillan’s tonal matching are fastidious. The dots are cleanly applied and never smeared.

Even though they allude to post-impressionism, McMillan likes to play with out of focus forms, hot incandescent flares, truncated rectangles and wrinkled dribbly picture planes. These deliberately vague works make interesting objects that are untypical of paintings. Non digital, alluding to science fiction and future time—and subtly ominous— some reference looking out of speeding cars through rain-drenched windscreens.

Others are much more abstract. They have a hint of self-reflectivity with rolling circles lined up on the grey windscreens, spinning discs that could be enlarged dots. These granular blurry works seem to be about vision and looking. They might also be overcast days in say, fog-covered Rita Angus Hawke’s Bay landscapes, sufficiently murky and dark as to imply an impending primal opacity, with embedded spinning buttons in the picture plane. Oblique, mysterious, and suggestive, they compress distance, time and categories—confounding art history, past, present and future; urban and rural; painting and photography.

John Hurrell

Print | Facebook | Twitter | Email

 

Recent Posts by John Hurrell

JH
Selina Foote, Berthe, 2025, acrylic and graphite on canvas, 600 x 500 mm

Foote’s Balustrades

TWO ROOMS

Selina Foote

 

The Balcony

 

15 August - 27 September 2025

JH
Tony de Lautour, Black Mountain 2 2025, acrylic on canvas, 750 x 1000mm

Obliterated Titular Language

IVAN ANTHONY GALLERY

Tony de Lautour

 

Location

 

26 July - 23 August 2025

JH
Richard Killeen, Catspiralcatspiral (9458), 2025, Ink jet and Bona Mega Matt varnish on ACM, 1000 x 480mm

Containing Meaning

IVAN ANTHONY GALLERY

Richard Killeen

 

Jar

 

26 July - 23 August 2025

JH
Steve Carr, Many Steves, 2025, pigment inkjet print; diptych each 1524 x 1016mm unframed, 1550 x 1045 x 35mm framed, 1550 x 2090mm framed overall Edition of 3 plus 1 artist's proof

Chortle Chuckle Carr

GOW LANGSFORD GALLERY

Steve Carr

 

How to Disappear

 

30 July - 23 August 2025