There is a familiar trail between Gisborne Turanganui-a-kiwa where PAULNACHE is based, and Auckland Tamaki Makaurau, home to Evan Woodruffe. Their long-distance relationship thrives on travel, a close collaboration that sustains an exciting exhibition schedule that grows out from these two cities and across the Asia-Pacific region.

Gallery director Matthew Nache is curious about the latest sculptural artwork summer 2021 from Evan, so phones him at his Akepiro Street Studios ...

MN: This work is next level! It seems to connect to some of your earlier sculptural pieces, but is also so different. Who have you connected to, to come up with this?

EW: Of course with my friends Strangely Normal, who’ve made clothes from fabric prints of my paintings since Sydney Contemporary in 2017. I’ve collaged old Strangely Normal shirts into my paintings since 2014, and having clothes made from the resulting images really opened up the conversation between the two. Importantly, it was a way to get the paintings off the wall and walking around the place.

MN: This work has a glam vaudeville feel to it, like it relates back to your collaborations with drag performer Elibra Fleur.

EW: The costume collaborations with Elibra Fleur at Auckland Art Fair 2016 and Tauranga Art Gallery 2018 created a dynamic that related to the glam aspect of my paintings. There was also the painted wardrobe at AAF, which I thought of more as a crazy four-legged model than a cabinet for clothes.

My new work summer 2021 is also glam, but is perhaps more like an explorer than a performer. As the title indicates, I started work on this project just as borders began closing, and finished it in late summer as the vaccinations began. The headpiece is a mask of sorts – partly ceremonial, partly protective. The suit is shiny, made from a new natural textile, but it’s also the sheen of PPE. The figure is hung with amulets to ward off evil. It’s brightly coloured, intricately patterned; glamorous, weird and wonderful!

MN:. It certainly seems more celebratory than functional.

EW: Glam comes out of hard times, it’s a reaction against deprivation. While I initially struggled with my role as an artist during last year’s lockdown, I realised that art is absolutely necessary in tough times to uplift us, to give us a way past our hardships. Summer 2021 is a work that faces the pandemic with a brilliant resolve – to continue.

MN: Your colours are really vibrant on the fabric – you say it’s a new natural textile?

EW: The people I use for the fabrics know I’ve a magpie eye, so alert me to anything new and shiny, for instance the silk velvet for the Tauranga Art Gallery show. This one is a silk- hemp blend, and the colours look almost metallic on it. It took months and months to receive, as worldwide shipping and manufacturing was struggling, but is the perfect result.

MN: I like that the mannequin can be dressed in any manner – you sent an image of its trousers around its ankles!

EW: Strangely Normal tailored the suit to the mannequin, so it fits beautifully but conceals all the paintwork when buttoned up, so I played around to get some better reveals. A bit of humour perfectly balances such an ornate artwork.

MN: I’m excited to present summer 2021 for the first time at TENT for Aotearoa Art Fair, especially in your apartment space. It will be right at home surrounded by your artworks and funky furniture.

EW: It will look like its stepped out of a painting! Our apartment is made for art, with high stud and big walls. We held a VIP event here for AAF 2018, and this time we’ll present very new works, many of which were made in this space rather than Akepiro Street Studios, due to Level 4 lockdown. It will be a different exhibition, following the TENT manifesto - intimate, personal, fleeting and all the more special for that.

Photography courtesy of the artist and artsdiary.co.nz

Summer 2021 was kindly funded by Creative New Zealand Toi Aotearoa