Lot 56: ROBERT HUNTER B. 1947

UNTITLED NO. 2

MEASUREMENTS

122 by 244 cm

Synthetic polymer paint on plywood Signed with initials, dated '97 and inscribed '2' on the reverse

'Robert Hunter works with house paint. Though his white paintings are abstract and have the glow of Zen or a quattrocento Annunciation, they are made of the everyday. The paint is diluted synthetic polymer paint, the dimensions are determined by the hardware units of plywood board... Hunter works mechanically, like a builder, using a roller and masking tape, so that his mind reaches a state of relaxation and the painting can "generate itself". The process becomes automatic, or subconscious, and the intricate geometry of these works seems to follow the irregularity of everyday thought. Despite the initial impression of neutrality, Hunter's art is about, or at least directed to, the subjective. His paintings emerge slowly, delicately. The viewer must adjust to the fine distinctions of tone... What we see almost seems to be generated by the act of perception itself. The paintings demand that we move about, examine them close up... Our mental processes merge with the act of vision, and the paintings flow out of and fold into our consciousness, like the shadows of our subjective experience.' (1) (1) Nicholson, T., in Wright, W. and Kanazawa, T. (eds), Systems End: Contemporary Art in Australia, Sherman Galleries, Sydney, 1996, p. 34.