STEVE CARR

Michael Lett is delighted to present X, a new solo exhibition by Steve Carr. The exhibition celebrates the gallery’s tenth year with a nod to Carr’s first solo show, Dive in 2003, which was the inaugurating exhibition at the Karangahape Road space.

Bringing together new works and reconfigured pieces from the last ten years, X highlights themes that have been a constant presence in Carr’s work since his first film, Air Guitar, in 2001. Alongside Air Guitar, Carr will present several key works including an updated Popcorn Mountain, 2006, which is based on the artist’s own weight, Donuts, 2007, and Cherries, 2004. Also included is a series of photographs titled Fireman’s Boots. Shot several years ago but until now never exhibited, Carr presents these images to provide another clue to his complex unpacking of the relationships between sculpture, childhood memories, and his own experience of the world.

The exhibition will also feature a new film work titled Dead Time: a seven-screen installation in which a succession of perfectly still apples are blown apart by a single bullet, tracing its way from one monitor to the next. The second in a series of major explorations of slow-motion technology, the work eloquently speaks to Carr’s ever-present concern with moments of magical transformation: a semi-mystical gesture located in the everyday that unleashes ripples of chaos and beauty in equal measure.

Steve Carr (born 1976 in Gore, New Zealand) lives and works in Auckland, New Zealand and London, UK. In March 2013 he will take up a three month Fulbright residency at Headlands Center for the Arts, Sausalito, California USA. Recent solo exhibitions include Studies in Motion, Kalimanrawlins, Melbourne, 2012; IMA@Ksubi, Institute of Modern Art, Brisbane, 2012; mystical realism's; modest gestures, Michael Lett, Auckland, 2011. Recent group exhibitions include Angelholm International Video Art Festival, Sweden, 2012; Rencontres Internationales, Centre Pompidou Paris, France; Haus der Kulturen der Welt, Berlin, Germany; Reina Sofia National Museum, Madrid, Spain, 2012; NZ International Film Festival, The Artists Cinema, Auckland City Art Gallery, Auckland, New Zealand, 2012; Daydream Believer, Yebisu International Festival for Art & Alternative Visions, Tokyo, Japan, 2011.