DAMIEN KURTH

B. New Zealand, 1972
Lives and works from the Bay of Plenty NZ.

AVAILABLE WORKS

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Master of Fine Arts, Elam School of Fine Arts, University of Auckland; Bachelor of Fine Arts, Otago Polytechnic

The ‘still life’ has been used as a genre for artists to pursue formal experimentation and philosophical investigation for centuries. In Damien Kurth’s paintings, commonplace objects provide an opportunity for the artist to focus on the physical act of painting whilst interrogating philosophical concepts of perception and semiotics. Kurth’s previous exhibition Reverb at Sanderson Gallery NZ explored the idea that our perception cannot simultaneously hold onto multiple interpretations (i.e what is abstract and representational) but instead oscillates between the two. This experience allows a fissure in one’s perception to occur; revealing new possibilities and modes of experience.

Kurth’s commonplace objects possess the ‘seemliness of the unfamiliar’ or ‘Jamais vu’ a term used to describe the experience of being unfamiliar with something that is normally very familiar.