MIKE PETRE

milford galleries queenstown9A Earl Street (03) 442 6896 [email protected]

2 - 27 October, 2010UPSTAIRS GALLERY

www.milfordgalleries.co.nz

MIKE PETRENEW WORKS

1. MIKE PETRE, Field Study 144 (2010) ink, graphite, oil & acrylic on canvas, stretcher

ink, graphite, oil & acrylic on canvas, stretcher (v x h x d): 1680 x 2800 x 35 mm

2. MIKE PETRE, Field Study 153 (2010)

ink, graphite, oil & acrylic on paper, frame (v x h x d): 588 x 518 x 20 mm

2. DETAIL VIEW MIKE PETRE, Field Study 153 (2010)


8. MIKE PETRE, Field Study 148 (2010), oil on paper, frame (v x h x d): 588 x 518 x 20 mm


oil on paper, frame (v x h x d): 588 x 518 x 20 mm

Repeated bovine forms drip down the canvas or emerge from grass-green impasto

backgrounds in Mike Petre’s exhibition of new works. From the extremely large

stretched canvas to the small framed works on paper, Mike Petre brings cattle into the

spotlight.

The very accurate anatomically correct proportions and the huge size of ‘Field Study

114’ makes it is easy to believe one is in the midst of a herd of these large confronting

beasts. It is clear Petre knows these animals inside and out.

The black and white mixed media on paper works have expressive and deceivingly

simple ink and paint application. With a single brush stroke Petre produces light and

shadow, form and shape - torsos and heads float in space. He manages to

simultaneously allude to rain drenched cattle on a stormy day and hanging carcasses

in a butchery.

Thick impasto oil paint is applied to paper in Field Studies 147 – 152. In these works the

animals start to merge into the landscape: Petre’s cattle are truly an integral part of

the rural environment.

Standing in the gallery surrounded by these inquisitive looking beasts one gets a strong

sense that the more you look the more interest the subject matter has in looking back.

This is the artist’s unusual, deliberate and confident accomplishment.

EXHIBITION PRICELIST

1 Field Study 144 (2010) 17,500

2 Field Study 153 (2010) 1,750

3 Field Study 154 (2010) 1,750

4 Field Study 155 (2010) 1,750

5 Field Study 156 (2010) 1,750

6 Field Study 158 (2010) 1,750

7 Field Study 159 (2010) 1,750

8 Field Study 148 (2010) 1,750

9 Field Study 147 (2010) 1,750

10 Field Study 149 (2010) 1,750

11 Field Study 150 (2010) 1,750

12 Field Study 152 (2010) 1,750

13 Field Study 151 (2010) 1,750

All prices are NZD and include GST; Prices are current at the time of the exhibition

Mike Petre 2010 CV milford galleries queenstown www.milfordgalleries.co.nz

P a g e | 1

MIKE PETRE b. 1964, lives Matakana

Field Study 113 (2009) “My work is a personal response to memory and experiences associated with spending a large part of

my life immersed in rural environments. My paintings are not an attempt to elevate, idealise or

romanticise the rural, but rather a means of exploring the notion of what it is, and what it means to be a

‘local’, and developing a visual language to convey this. New Zealand has a rich and varied history of

landscape painting yet I feel little has been attempted within the visual arts to explore issues of localised

rural experience and landscape. Historically New Zealand landscape painting depicts ‘visiting the

landscape’ with all its implied transferral of ‘Urban Experience’, - a romanticising experience.” 1

In the ‘field study’ series of works the animals have become the object of intense scrutiny. The

background has been removed, “with the object becoming a landscape within themselves.” With

gallery installation, the viewer is placed within the landscape and forced into “a degree of scrutiny

many would be unfamiliar (if not uncomfortable) with…- the reality of raising animals for slaughter and

viewing the land for production necessitates objectification. My work is an attempt to capture this

objectification, as well as negotiate ‘identity’ within the New Zealand landscape.” 2

The cattle paintings appear deceptively simple. “The images are actually built up through a sequence

of processes.” In the ‘Field Study’ series the oil adds “to the dripped and drawn effect of the ink to give

a sense of the wetness of living skin, a challenging immediacy. …The factual, unromantic approach to

beef farming (the images in the ‘Steer’ series being marked with crayon as for meat-cuts or production

lots) brings a confrontational edge to the vision of our landscape as picturesque or pastorale.” 3

Born Piopio, New Zealand 1964. Bachelor of Agriculture (Management), Massey University, Palmerston

North, 1986. Bachelor of Design, Carrington Polytechnic, 1994. Raised on a sheep and beef farm in

Piopio (King Country). Worked on farms in New Zealand before studying for an agriculture degree and

in the UK and Israel afterwards.

Following his graduation from design studies, Petre was a founder member of Sturdee studios and in

1998 of Indicator studios. He began exhibiting via the studios in 1995 and since 1997 has exhibited in

dealer galleries in Auckland, Wellington and Dunedin. He has been a finalist in the three Wallace

Awards he has entered (1998, 1999 & 2001) and in 2001 was featured in episode 4 of TVNZ’s ‘The Big Art

Trip’.

(1) Artist’s Statement, 2002.

(2) ibid.

(3) Helen Watson White, ‘Field work’, Sunday Star Times, 16 June 2002


P a g e | 2

MIKE PETRE b. 1964, lives Matakana

EDUCATION

1994 Bachelor of Design 3D, Carrington Polytechnic

1985 Bachelor of Agriculture (Management), Massey University

SELECTED SOLO EXHIBITIONS

2010 New Works, milford galleries queenstown

2009 New Works, milford galleries auckland

2007 New Works, McPherson Gallery, Auckland

2006 New Works, Milford Galleries Dunedin

2005 McPherson Gallery, Auckland

Mahurangi Gallery, Mahurangi Estate

2004 New Works, Milford Galleries Dunedin

2003 New Works, McPherson Gallery, Auckland

2002 Field Study, Milford Galleries Dunedin



SELECTED GROUP EXHIBITIONS

2010- The Mahurangi Group, Matakana

The Royal Queenstown Easter Show, milford galleries queenstown

2008 The Taranaki Gate, Percy Thomson Gallery, Stratford, Taranaki

2007 The Mahurangi Group, Villa Tamahunga, Matakana

2006 The Mahurangi Group, Puhoi

A & P Show: Art Goes Country, Christchurch Art Gallery

2005 The Mahurangi Group, Mahurangi Estate, Warkworth

2004 George Perry Gallery, Tauranga

Menagerie, North Shore Community Art Centre, North Shore

From the River to the Sea, The Mahurangi Group, Puhoi

2003 Indicator Studio Group Show, Auckland

2002 McPherson Gallery Group Show, Auckland

2001 Bowen Gallery Group Show

Wallace Art Awards Finalist Touring Exhibition

Indicator Studio Group Show

2000 McPherson Gallery ‘100 x 100’ Group Show, Auckland

Indicator Studio Group Show, Auckland

1999 Wallace Art Awards Finalist

100 x 100 Group Show, Drawings Gallery, Auckland

Choice, McPherson Gallery, Auckland

1998 100 x 100 Group Show, Drawings Gallery, Auckland

Indicator, Studio Group Show

Wallace Art Awards Finalist

1997 100 x 100 Group Show, Drawings Gallery, Auckland

Sturdee Studio Group Show

1996 Sturdee Studio Group Show

1995 Sturdee Studio Group Show

AWARDS

2004 Finalist Art Waikato National Art Award



2001-2002 Finalist and Touring Show Wallace Art Awards

1998 Finalist Wallace Art Awards

1996 Finalist Wallace Art Awards


P a g e | 3

COLLECTIONS

Wallace Trust

Zealandia (Terry Stringer)

BIBLIOGRAPHY 2009 Sunday Star Times, Sunday Magazine, January 2009

2008 NZ Life and Leisure, Issue 19, 2008

BMW Magazine, Feature Article, Autumn 2008

2007 New Zealand Herald, November 2007

New Zealand Herald, September 2007

NZ Lawyer, March, 2006

2006 Otago Daily Times, March, 2006

Otago Daily Times, July 2006

2005 New Zealand Herald, August, 2005

2004 Bay of Plenty Times, November 2004

New Zealand Listener, June, 2004

Home Front, TVNZ, Channel One, July, 2004

Critic, August, 2004

2003 Canvas, July, 2003

2002 Art News NZ, Winter, 2002

The Big Art Trip, TV NZ, Episode 4, screened Sept 2001 TV1, repeated Jan 2002

Otago Daily Times, June, 2002

Sunday Star Times, June, 2002

2001 New Zealand Herald, September, 2001

2000 Sunday Star Times, October, 2000

New Zealand Herald, October, 2000

Metro, June, 2000, pp. 94-99

Field Study 122 (2009)

MIKE PETRE

Documents

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