Julian Dashper: Professional Practice

Julian Dashper (1960-2009) once commented that it takes courage to write ‘artist’ as one’s occupation on forms when travelling. It was a statement of encouragement to the generation of students that he taught, but also a statement of his own position.

Over nearly 30 years as an exhibiting artist Dashper built a significant body of work that is one of the most diverse and intriguing of New Zealand’s established contemporary artists. Dashper’s words and work also express a lifelong engagement with New Zealand’s distance from the ‘centres’ of artistic production in Europe and America, and the consequential travel of materials and ideas backwards and forwards. From engagement with the visual references of abstract-expressionist painting in the 1980s to the minimalism of the later works, including sound recordings made in front of important works of art and exhibiting his CV, Dashper developed a rigorous and prolific practice in which the idea of ‘being’ an artist was a significant reference point.

The works selected for this exhibition reflect some of the critical strands to his practice, while also sharing some lesser-known gems. From one of the rarely seen ‘velvet’ paintings of the early 1980s, to his last exhibited video made at the 2007 Venice Biennale, the exhibition seeks to open a conversation between the diverse elements of Dashper’s practice and demonstrate a consistently inquisitive and innovative approach to the idea of art-making and to the beauty of ideas.