Cathryn Shine captures the beauty of Italy

Cathryn Shine captures the beauty of Italy

The romantic, ineffable beauty of Italy has inspired a new suite of images from Canterbury University photographer and printmaker Cathryn Shine.

Ms Shine, senior lecturer and Convenor of the Fine Arts Studios in the School of Fine Arts, photographed the images while on study leave in Italy. However, it was while she was on a visiting research fellowship at the University of Newcastle, Australia, that she had the opportunity to put them together as a new body of work.

This work, a suite of 30 photo intaglio prints, will be exhibited as part of the University of Canterbury’s arts festival, Platform, as Sotto Un Cielo Avorio (Under an Ivory Sky). The exhibition will be held at the SOFA Gallery, the University of Canterbury art gallery in the city centre.

Better known for her photographic panoramas of sky, sea and the Italian landscape, Ms Shine has produced more intimate and visually intriguing images which capture the beauty of the ordinary places of Italy: domestic landscapes, doorways, gardens, archaeological sites and a wall pieced together from blocks carved in bas-relief.

Each image, hand-printed in the School of Fine Arts’ Printmaking Studio, has a romantic, dreamlike quality created through the printing process.

“What interests me is light with aspects of surrealism, and in concepts that are not immediately revealed in an image. These images are not only photographic but through their soft printed quality details of the images are revealed. These details are found in the soft bloom of ink, giving them an ethereal quality.”

Sotto Un Cielo Avorio will be exhibited at the SOFA Gallery in the Christchurch Arts Centre until 14 September. The gallery is open Monday to Friday, 11am to 5pm, and weekends 12pm to 4pm. Entry is free.

More information about the Platform festival can be found at www.canterbury.ac.nz/platform.

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