Georgie Hill and Hannah Valentine explore the natural and abstract realms

Georgie Hill, Concave Iridescence

Hannah Valentine, Interference

Visions Gallery, Lorne St, Auckland

Until September 26

Reviewed by John Daly-Peoples

In two shows at Visions Gallery Georgie Hill and Hannah Valentine explore means  of investigation and assessment in both the natural and abstract realms.

Georgie Hill’s set of watercolours “Concave Iridescence” bring together several aspects of exploration but central to them is the notion of chaos being controlled, of our desire to impose an order on what can seem to be random.

In a separate show of the artists small works there are examples of  experimenting with shapes and colours. These are shorthand painterly notes for possible larger works with a mixture of juxtaposition and contrasts of colour as well as elements of collage. They are investigations into colour field, graffiti, diagrams and the  emotional / spiritual impact of colour.

These works become the basis of her larger pieces where the underlying colour fields in many cases resemble man made or natural camouflage patterns which can be read as cosmological, ecological or topological. Over these colour fields the artist imposes elements which create something of a sense of order, turning the loose abstractions into something more defined. She uses what look like like contour lines or the isobars on a weather map as well as straight lines resembling the range poles used by surveyors. These geometric lines as in “Spectral Signature – 4” ($3300) provide, structure and order to the abstract landscape.

Hannah Valentine’s exhibition “Interference” is also concerned with notions of measurement being focussed on the natural environment with a set of bronze sculptures replicating Argo floats  (Argo #4  -$3200) which are robots that float at different depths in the sea collecting data about temperature and salinity which is sent to a satellite.

These found  or commodity sculptures which follow in the tradition of facsimiles produced by Jeff Koons and Michael Parekowhai are an acknowledgement of the interface between the natural world, scientific investigation and climate change.

She also has a number of smaller bronzes works which are based on sea life and the  measurement of the oceans characteristics. There are some small lumps of coral such as “As the Ocean Goes #4” ($600) and tendrils of seaweed “As the Ocean Goes #6” ($600) while “Eddy #4” ($600) is an abstract depiction of currents and “Steps #1” ($1500) a diagram of wave or sand patterns.

See images and catalogues at

visions.art