Chroma by Carole Shepheard & Holly Shepheard

Oscar Wilde said 'Mere colour, unspoiled by meaning, and unallied with definite form, can speak to the soul in a thousand different ways'
We live in a world filled with colour. Most of the time we just absorb the colours we are surrounded by and subconsciously respond to the feelings they generate within us at any moment in time or given environment. Some colours have come to represent states of being, blue translates to peace, green - harmony/tranquility, red - danger. We can have a colour we are immediately drawn to, we experience an immediate visceral response to this colour and sometimes the opposite is also true. Recently at the 'Light from Tate' exhibition at Auckland Art Gallery, I stood within the black interior of the work by Anish Kapoor and felt physically ill. I was overwhelmed with a terrible sense of the colour or actually absence of colour, absence of light seeping into my soul. The response came upon me immediately and took me completely by surprise. I backed out of the work and had to physically shake the colour from me.
Wassily Kandinsky said 'Colour hides a power still unknown but real, which acts on every part of the human body.'
Both Carole Shepheard and Holly Shepheard explore this power in their current bodies of work.
The paintings in this exhibition Chroma focus on highly saturated colour, exploring its depth and intensity. Both artists work in a non figurative way and through their work recognise the subliminal connections we have to 'place' and the role colour/chroma plays on our way of being. Colour, composition and meaning are symbiotic in these works. Both artists have used layers of concentrated colour to create feelings of immersion and entanglement.
We are very excited to be showing the work of these two artists. Not only is this show going to be a wonderful visual conversation between two experienced artists but for me it is also a conversation between mother and daughter. It is about heritage, the passing on of knowledge and the joy found in the process. It is about the daughter Holly who has watched her mother Carole, all her life, live and breathe her craft while bringing up and caring for her family. This way of 'being' has been embraced and explored by Holly but redefined in her own way. She has found her own creative path and voice.
Carole Shepheard is a well-known printmaker and painter. Holly Shepheard an exhibiting artist who has continued working with ink and resin, a medium she discovered at Elim as a painting student.
We invite you the opening event on Saturday 20th May 3 - 5pm all welcome
Exhibition: Tuesday 16th May - Saturday 3rd June