In living colour
Acclaimed New York artists Anthony Aziz and Sammy Cucher admit inspiration for their works can come at any time and in any place.
The artists claim it is the time in between working on their innovative digital photography designs when they are struck with the best ideas.
The celebrated duo visited Sydney for the first time for a month-long holiday to enjoy Mardi Gras and to launch their exhibition Synaptic Bliss at the new Artereal Gallery.
Art lovers should not be too surprised in the future if Aziz and Cucher return to Australia with a new exhibition inspired by their recent Australian adventure.
They claim the beauty of the Australian landscape and the Aboriginal artworks they viewed have fired up their imaginations.
We have taken so many photos from Sydney, so we have a lot of new material to work from, Aziz says. It is likely our next body of work will be based on material we gathered here.
We have been to the Blue Mountains, Queensland and all around Sydney, so we have lots to look at and turn into an exhibition. We might bring it back to show here or open it in Europe.
Cucher then adds: We had seen Aboriginal art before, but had never seen so much of it and we’ve had the chance to understand and learn about it. It’s about a story and telling what was going on with the people that is very interesting.
Synaptic Bliss features work the couple, who first met in a San Francisco art school and have been together for the past 15 years, have produced since 1999.
The Interiors series features images of skin covered rooms, where the environment uses human skin to become a reflective surface. The other two series, Nocturnes and Odes, feature works of landscapes using layered patterns and vivid colours.
Aziz and Cucher claim the series have been inspired by changes in the world over the past seven years.
This kind of art is a response to true-life experience, Cucher says. We want to express in our work our life experiences, not just from an intellectual point of view, but from an emotional point of view as well.
He then explains the Interiors series is a reaction to the shift in the AIDS crisis in the late 1990s, when new medicines changed the way the virus operated within the human body.
This is a reaction to the whole AIDS crisis -娄 it was certainly coloured by the presence of this disease, and the conjunction of death and sexuality, Cucher says. Nothing we did came from one particular event, but it was more about the conversations the world was having through that period of time.
Aziz then adds, We create a work and then, ultimately, it is a matter of what people want to take away from it emotionally and psychologically.
I like to listen to what people say at a gallery about the works -鈥� it is such a cross-section of reactions, and always fascinating.
Synaptic Bliss is on exhibition until 29 April at Artereal Gallery, 747 Darling Street, Rozelle. See the .
