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STEWART CRAWFORD

opening night | wednesday august 4, 6–8pm
exhibition | august 4–24

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Our life in the city is at the heart of Stewart Crawford’s new exhibition opening at Gallery@28. Presenting mixed media paintings using acrylic and chalk pastel as well as drawings, Crawford’s art “observes how we all live in the city and interact with each other”. His street scenes – mostly from Sydney– will be familiar to many and are inhabited by an eclectic mix of people.

“People are so interesting, their different faces, their clothes, what they’re doing whether waiting for a bus or having a coffee. My paintings represent a colorful mosaic of city life.” One of the artist’s tasks, says Crawford “is to present the special nature of things that we see in everyday life but take for granted”. You don’t have to go to exotic places to see something special, he says.

Crawford’s fascination with the urban environment has its roots in his upbringing in Birmingham in the UK – a city with a gritty urban reputation. His family moved to Australia when he was a teenager and, after he studied geography at university, he trained initially as a town planner. “I’ve always been fascinated with cities throughout my life and my current works and other paintings with aerial views of cities are examples of that.”

Coming down to street level, Crawford trawls the city, taking documentary-style source photographs of things and people that interest him. Inspired by the French photographers, Doisneaux and Cartier-Bresson, Crawford’s Australian city dwellers move between moments of isolation and contemplation to dynamic interaction.

“The modern city, its architecture, streets, pace of life and complexity offers me a vibrant and rich context in which to capture, for the moment, the life of the individual and group,” says Crawford. As urban dwellers, it’s our shared city experience, the recognition that we are at once individuals yet dependent on each other for the success of our complex society, that makes Crawford’s work so poignant.

Crawford trained at the National Art School in Sydney, graduating in 2004. Since then, his work has been short-listed for the Adelaide Perry Drawing prize in 2007 and 2008 and has appeared in the Salon des Refuses and Alternative Archibald and Wynne Exhibitions and currently in the Mosman Art Prize 2010. 

For more information or high resolution images contact

Kate Hopkinson-Pointer
GALLERY@28
0402 144 350
khp@galleryat28.com.au

Previous Exhibition Media Releases
Nahomi Yoshizawa: Inner Journey
Gallery@28 Group Exhibition: Erotic
Michael Fairweather: The Salon
Bianca Van Rangelrooy: Mutable Landscapes
Yiwon Park: My Own Pacific Ocean
Donna Smullen: Written on the Body
Chas Glover
Leah Fraser: The Jabberwocky Prayers
Peter Berner
Pedro Vasques: Edge of Civilisation