BRUCE HUNT: Central (2010)

Bruce Hunt has made the subject of the Central Otago landscape identifiably his own. He traverses the landscape from mountain top high. The birds-eye view built from that vantage point is delivered with ‘as-if-there’ sensations that are fundamental to how the viewer comes to experience his paintings.

He combines dialogues about the interlocking geometry of landforms and the valley by valley phenomenon of weather, uses the diagonal contrasts of light and dark, with the remarkable assured use of a tightly defined palette. He presents panoramic scale and uses pictorial depth to broaden the manner in which the viewer engages with the work, so that each painting seems to rise in front of the viewer as if from under their feet. Multiple lines of sight are instantly established and revealed. Each painting has the repeated rhythm of line, the kisses of light and dark along ridges and takes us into the centre of an alpine landscape that is revealed as distinctive and endless.