Once in a purple and blue moon
Artist displays his Aquarius Moon series of works in exhibition
Deano Shirriffs doesn’t believe in telling viewers of his paintings what to think by naming them. His first solo exhibition at Zimmerman Art Gallery in Palmerston North is called Aquarius Moon,
but the 16 mixed media paintings being exhibited are untitled.
A friend once said he appreciated the way Shirriffs did not name individual works as it respected the viewer’s imagination. They were given space to decide what they saw in the works, rather than being directed by the artist.
The feedback stuck with Shirriffs and he continues to use it in his practice.
The Longburn resident tries to spend as much time as he can on his art. He has a studio in Taonui St in Palmerston North, which is where last October he exhibited his Aries Sun
series.
It took a year for Aquarius Moon
to be fully realised. A couple of paintings were not behaving, but will live to tell their story another day.
Shirriffs unselfconsciously anthropomorphises his works, sharing he is happy with the way they talk to each other. It is nice to get them out of his ears and into an uncluttered gallery where he can better see them.
He refers to the paint, spray paint and resin combination he uses as a recipe with almost infinite variations.
A year provides time to experiment with temperature variables as he learns how his materials dry and crack.
The Aries Sun and Aquarius Moon
collections refer to the planetary alignment at the time of his birth in 1982 at Palmerston North Hospital. The sun sign was Aries Sun and the moon sign was Aquarius Moon.
After leaving Palmerston North Boys’ High School, Shirriffs studied at various tertiary institutes. He has a Bachelor of Fine Arts from Otago Polytechnic, where he was top of the painting department in his year.
When he is not painting, he curates “uncling days” for his nephews, aged 5 and 7. These include visiting exhibitions and the theatre during school holidays.
Gallery owner Bronwyn Zimmerman describes Shirriffs’ landscapes as glowing, ethereal, and luminous. Photographs don’t do justice to the texture and resin seal.
She wanted every wall used to display Aquarius Moon to look
distinctively different. Each work has an individual voice and she wouldn’t want to take any of them out — it feels like all should be here.
When Zimmerman was setting up the exhibition, passersby were stopping to say “wow”, and their smiles told her they appreciated the paintings.
Shirriffs has pushed his mediums to their extremes in his latest paintings, experimenting with textured surfaces and layering effects beneath resin waves, she says.
Shirriffs says the Rob Walker galaxy tie-dye T-shirt he often wears helped inspire the colours for this exhibition. He traded it for an Aries Sun print.
Would the Aquarius Moon paintings approve?
The exhibition runs until October 29.