Nicholas Hutcheson Art for Sale and Sold Prices

b. 1975 -

Young British artist Nicholas Hutcheson will present his first Australian exhibition of contemporary drawings / works on paper at Andrew Baker Art Dealer in February 2004. Born in Buckinghamshire, England in 1975, Nicholas studied Illustration at Bristol University and since graduating has exhibited in London, Bristol, Cardiff and Stroud (UK).

Inspired by the mummies of the Attacama desert (Chile) and by the remains of animals and trees in Australia’s arid outback, the works map the passage of time upon these structures. Outsized and striking, the pieces construct interior landscapes from vestiges of skin, bone and bark – simultaneously familiar and surprising. Nicholas’ accomplished mark-making and deft use of colour produces arresting and unsettling works of complexity and originality.

This exhibition marks a shift in subject matter for the artist. Hitherto concerned with the disintegration of monolithic man-made structures industrial landscapes, his new work draws upon organic structures affected by the depredations of time. Observed when travelling in South America, the Chinchorro mummies are remarkable for their shapes, colours and plasticity. Dismembered, re-assembled (with the addition of reeds, clay, sticks and llama fur) and re-upholstered, the bodies of the departed were coated with black manganese or brilliant red ochre.

The colours of the Attacama are echoed in Nicholas’ works dealing with Australia’s interior where bauxite and ochre are the ceremonial adornment of the living rather than the dead. Preserved in aridity, the desiccated forms of kangaroos, lizards and trees come to resemble the geography and geology of the land itself: layers of strata contoured by the millennia.
‘All that Remains’ gives us trees shedding bark alongside the disinterred remains of a 7000 year old man – and reveals the beauty beneath the surface of skin.