David Boyce – Mixed Messages
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New Exhibition
David Boyce – Mixed Messages
21st August – 15th September 2008
Opening: Thursday 21st August, 5.00-7.00PM
For David Boyce’s fifth solo exhibition at Photospace gallery, he presents a series of composite works made from
abstract photographs gathered from the walls and streets of Hong Kong. Although these large works resemble banners of
Chinese calligraphy, they do not read as actual words or sentences; rather they play upon and explore the concept of
photography as (international) language and also the visual nature of written languages. The second gallery room
contains an installation of some hundreds of photographs of koi carp, also photographed in China.
Language, communication, these are so much part of what we are we take them for granted. I am very interested in
language, and as such, and being a visual artist, in its visual basis to communication.
Living in China and coping with a foreign language can, obviously, be troubling at times. Where I am it is not so bad.
English is common enough that you can get by with a mixture of (bad) Cantonese and English, combined with some body
language and gestures. But the written language is, for the most part, incomprehensible.
The idea from these works came from several threads. One of these is the beauty of Chinese calligraphy. There is an
emphasis on aesthetic harmony in calligraphy, both in the written words and in the presentation; like there is in
western illuminated manuscripts.
For a while now I have been producing the occasional work based around random groupings of a series of related abstract
images. I had begun a series of these taken from images of markings on sports fields in Hong Kong. While showing some of
these images to a local curator she remarked on how one set imitated Chinese characters. This comment was a catalyst to
explore the idea further and combine the beauty of something that exists in day to day life into a larger body of work.
What evolved is what you see on the walls. I have distilled the message down to an abstraction, colour, shape and
rhythm.
Artist information:
David Boyce has exhibited at Photospace gallery in solo and group shows since 2002. His work has been included in
exhibitions at Enjoy, Wellington, Thermostat Gallery, Palmerston North, The Sarjeant Gallery, Wanganui, The NZCP (Shed
11), Wellington, The John Batten Gallery, Hong Kong, Too Art, Hong Kong, and The Twain-Tippets Gallery, Utah State
University. His work is held in public and private collections in New Zealand, North America, Europe and Asia.
ENDS
www.photospace.co.nz
www.photospacegallery.com