The Great Walls
This exhibition is the culmination of a decade long passion for creating a body of work that draws together the ethos of both the fine and applied arts.
Drawing on traditional craftsmanship Kurt Schranzer grounds the conceptual rigor of his fine art practice within exquisite marquetry panels.[i] Schranzer comes from a family of skilled craftsmen; his father, Josef Schranzer (born 1937, St Paul im Lavanttal, Austria), works as a cabinetmaker and his late maternal grandfather, Henry Moore, (born 1879, Manchester, England), worked as an engineer's patternmaker.
Schranzer's work pays homage to the skills and creativity displayed by his father and grandfather with a mix of motifs, techniques, style and tradition. The reconfiguration of classic patterns, such as checkerboard, diamond and cube, are matched with the aesthetic beauty of exotic woods and constructed veneers. The resulting panels, both pictorial and abstract in design, evoke an architectural presence that references the likes of Ancient Roman villas and Renaissance perspective.
The genesis for The Great Walls began in 2001 when Schranzer was creating large scale wall drawings that investigated the formal elements of pictorial space and 'rejected the confining influence of the frame.' In The Great Walls, Schranzer has explored the idea of pictorial space in relation to the architectural confines of the gallery space. Two dimensional works and high relief panels act as windows onto unscripted fantasies. Trompe-l'œil and architectural elements, such as courtyards, columns and towers, trigger both cultural and imaginative connections and set the scene for an unending series of poetic narratives.
In The Great Walls project, Kurt Schranzer lives up to his renowned identity as a superb draughtsman.
