Working with sticky tape comes with its own unique hazards - sticking fingers together, fluff covered tape, tape sealed to tape. For some, even wrapping presents is a minefield. But when you’ve installed thousands of pieces of the heavy duty stuff onto gallery walls, you develop a pretty good technique, according to Ben Buchanan.
Ben took five days to install his work FOREVER(S) in Aratoi’s Windows Gallery. As you walk through the Windows corridor, it feels like wave upon wave of intense colour is shifting and pulsating around you. The effect is achieved by hundreds of ‘tiles’ of coloured vinyl adhesive that Ben has laid down to create stepped bands of colour, bringing to mind diverse formats from quilts and South American weaving and architecture, to computer art and trance music videos. Ben, whose work has been described as “simultaneously garish and calming”, says he is pleased that there are lots of resonances. He is interested in connections with music and popular culture, and has a foot in both design and fine arts ‘camps’, having recently exhibited at Beijing International Design Week during a three-month residency at the city’s Red Gate Gallery.
Ben says he was expecting a conservative, buttoned down society in China but the urban landscape and street culture was more than vibrant enough to satisfy a colour obsessive like himself.
Since graduating from Elam in 1998, the New Plymouth born artist has exhibited regularly around New Zealand, and his vinyl site-specific installations have appeared at the Dunedin Public Art Gallery (2009) and the Dowse Art Museum (2012). He got into this mode of working via painting. “I was using a lot of masking tape to get hard edges in my paintings then one day thought ‘why don’t I use tape on its own?’.”
His aim is to “engage people with the space and make some sort of ‘interruption’ in the gallery”, and his is pleased to have his show running alongside ‘Chromatic Investigations’ by Milan Mrkusich: “I am a huge fan of his work, he is one of my favourite artists.”
Currently showing at Aratoi: 'Milan Mrkusich: Chromatic Investigations and Paintings from the 90s’, until 31 Jan; 'Ben Buchanan: FOREVER(S)’, until 31 Jan; New Work by Dennis Handyside, until 31 Jan 2015.
