Art Reviews

O'Sullivan lineal in abstracts

ART by Avenal McKinnon

Phillip O'Sullivan abstract works on exhibition at Galerie Legard

are essentially an expression of a utopian vision.

O'Sullivan taught by Campbell-Smith in Hamilton and Rudi Gopas

at Canterbury University Art School, was based in Auckland from

1970-1980 where he was connected with the group around Petar Vuletic.

In 1980 he moved to Wellington and this is his first exhibition here.

In terms of his reduction of the painting surfaces to a geometric

structuring of line and colour,O'Sullivan appears to return to the

fundamental formal abstactions of Mondrian and the Bahaus group.

Like them he uses a system of verticals and horizontals,

primary colours and a harmony of light against dark

Through simplicity of form he aims at purity and the ideal.

His brief pencil sketches, like mathematical cyphers, reveal the

analytical process of structuring his arrangements-a balance

sought and directed by the artists intuition.

But whereas the grids of Mondrians abstractions

reach from edge to edge like fragments from some

greater order, O'Sullivans bands never quite touch

the borders of his frames as though emphasising

an internalised, unattainable ideal.

His intellectual framework of verticals and horizontals

is humanised by areas of transparent overpainting

and a merging of colours.

Black blends into dark blue, hard whites blend

into creamy canvas, matte areas into high gloss

in a gesture of expansiveness.

Where his horizontals and vertical bands intersect

crosses are formed-Christian icons which hint

at mysticism- a symbolic content reinforced

by O'Sullivans titles: "St John of the Cross", "Spartacus"

"Matauranga".

Phillip O'Sullivans art is a disciplined structuring of rhythm

and proportion which reaches towards an ideal. It is an

abstract art form which offers equilibrium and harmony.

Evening Post April 2 1983

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O'Sullivan: buried surprises

by Ian Wedde

At Gallerie Legarde, Phillip O'Sullivan's "Hand Painted Asymmetries"

mark a return to exhibiting after regular shows through the 70s

in rigorous abstractionist contexts with the Petar/James Gallery

and Gallery DATA in Aucland, both dedicated to the promotion

of artists such as Mrkusich, Walters, and Scott.

Gallery DATA, an experiment in artists co-operative, was short lived

( eighteen months: ed). These days its place has to some extent

been taken by Artis Gallery, where Gordon Walters is presently

showing works that reach back to his 50s motifs,

and where newer abtractionists like the talented Julia Morrison

are scheduled.

O'Sullivan announces clear precedents in this show: Malevich,

Albers, Rothko, MrKusich (actually: Mondrian, Kandinsky, Tapies,

Barnett Newman; ed.) - there's a certain veering between hard edge,

and something looser with concealed content.

Sometimes this results in a kind of involuntary genre parody:

"Number One," a black stripe to the right of a white

rectangular field, is a case in point. "Birds through a ceiling of alabaster,"

an ivory colour-field (like Robert Ryman) , reads like

a state -of -the- art synopsis of what happened to those

white paintings Malevich wanted to install in place of icons

more than half a century ago.

Its a line of inquiry that MrKusich, alone, has been able to sustain here,

though younger artists like Stephen Bambury have laboured over

this most difficult of precedents.

But where the amalgam works out for O'Sullivan,

these paintings are excellent. "Towards Jerusalem,"

which floats a pale circular illumination off-centre

in a beautifully worked, rather tachiste field of pale yellow,

is a stunning, with brushwork that seems to pay homage

to McCahons chrysanthemum.

And the best works turn up a few buried surprises.

O'Sullivan is a somewhat over- delicate colourist,

but when he gets it right, as in "Hyacinth Garden"

(acrylic 1984) or ""Hybrid" (acrylic 1985), the

almost transparent surfaces, with a fresco like texture,

reveal him as a closet romantic.

In "Hybrid" some writing is barely concealed

by the loosely brushed paint . This is the signature

of the involvement of personality, not easily released

by such an initially cool art. In "Number One," for example,

it remains concealed.

"Hyacinth Garden" also shows O'Sullivan to be at his best

where painterly impulses (rather than literary ones)

ruffle his austere surfaces.

Here a stretcher is horizontally divided along a bottom quarter

into pale green and grey bands. These in turn are divided

through a left- of- centre vertical quadrant.

The proportions are serious and exactingly worked out,

the colours and brush textures are light and lyrical,

again with that chalky fresco-like transparency.

Some splashing informalises the composition.

The result is a nice tension between the lyric and the austere.

But where O'Sullivans intensity over-obtrudes

pastiche takes over and the results are less fine,

looking somewhat like work-outs. (These are the works I did labour over to perfection: artist )We could certainly

hope to see a more ruthlessly edited show in

Wellington soon, though.

Evening Post Tuesday July 23 1985