Neo I presents a vigorous selection of new works, reflecting fresh and innovative approaches to materials, techniques and ideas.

Russell Moses distils environmental essences into abstracted forms, utilising formal simplification whilst innovating the space between sculpture and painting. The varied, worked textures and surfaces explore light and movement in an impressionistic ever mutating synthesis.

Directly informed by hiking in the Southern Alps, the interlacing of weaving patterns and Kaitiakitanga, Laurelee Walmsley reconstructs memory. Utilising rectangular blocks of colour while exploring the fracturing of light, variable distance and physical structure, Walmsley takes the viewer into the twisting, changing, moments of each location and of being there. In that manner, other layers of perception emerge encompassing the interconnectedness of wairua, time past and present, and spiritual presence.

The soft tonalities and textures of Yuki Kihara’s pair of wreath photographs develop another (memorial) perspective in her acclaimed, extended, Aotea’ula series. The indigenous mushrooms featured bloom from dead wood, generating growth from decay and transformative beauty from loss.

Drawing on motifs of weaving and Pasifika histories told through pattern, 2024 Arts Foundation Te Tumu Toi Laureate Lonnie Hutchinson (Kāi Tahu, Sāmoa) translates these elements through modern materials. Brushed stainless steel is cut into a complex network of taro leaves in her work Tilotilo (peek/look).

Pushing the New Zealand landscape into a conversation about the sublime, Simon Edwards’ atmospheric paintings continue his engagement with romanticism while exploring the territories between realism and abstraction.

Contrasting clear eyed hyper realism with a nostalgic sensibility, Elliot Love utilises classical compositional elements such as the rule of thirds to provide the architecture for his urban landscapes devoid of humans but featuring portraits of cars of a certain age. He recalls these vehicles as his teenage “ticket to freedom” and links time, memory and emotion into adroitly delivered cityscapes.

Hannah Kidd’s practice engages parable, metaphor, allegory and narrative as key components of a remarkable ability to capture nuances of character and gesture through her idiosyncratic use of welded metals. Dance Monkey I & II question our close interconnection with primates.