CHANGING ATMOSPHERES
2 Feb 2023
26 Feb 2023
Anet Neutze
“Is there a change in the climate?”, was the question on which Anet Neutze reflected as she created the abstract watercolours for this solo exhibition. Changing Atmospheres is a response to the current deepening existential crises driven by capitalism and expectations of success: from climate change and pandemics, to widening social divides between rich and poor, and a reluctance to counter these threats through making changes to comfortable contemporary lifestyles.
Dunedin-Ōtepoti based artist Neutze regularly uses watercolours as an aspect of her work that she has exhibited across multiple shows in New Zealand. Her practice spans botanical illustration to abstract paintings that regularly embrace a cell-like motif to create movement, space, and ambiguity. In Changing Atmospheresshe explores new techniques through working with non-absorbent plywood panels. Their knots leach oils that make visible their own modifications of this human endeavour, demonstrating further organic exchanges of atmospheres.
“The work in Changing Atmospheres has been a process of intuition and chance,” Neutze explains. “Traditionally, watercolour on paper is an absorbent technique. But due to the plastic surface of the background underpainting on Plyboard, the watercolour paint tends to float on the surface, rather than being absorbed. This creates an unusual flexibility to any outcomes.”