21 March – 13 April 2024
about the exhibition
Kirrily Humphries is a Canberra based artist known for her astoundingly detailed paintings and drawings that depict scenes within abandoned, derelict structures. In this exhibition, Kirrily has focused purely on drawing, creating a suite of thirteen restrained, yet powerful, compositions. The exhibition title ‘Colossal wreck’ comes from the poem, Ozymandias by Percy Bysshe Shelley and explores the transient nature of human power and creations:
“… My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings;
Look on my Works, ye Mighty, and despair!
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal Wreck, boundless and bare.
The lone and level sands stretch far away.”
For Kirrily, these words hold force as she confronts her own anxieties about the brevity of human legacy. The intriguing titles of her works are drawn from graffiti, books, magazines, signs, paperwork, posters etc that are associated with each site, the dated and unexpected nature of them reflecting the experience of exploring the locations themselves. As Kirrily says of her work, “I feel a heightened sense of physical presence, an amplified sensory awareness. The excited terror of exploring a space forbidden or unknown intensifies this experience, presenting a realm for fantasy, anticipation and unfolding narrative.” She builds up her pencil compositions over many layers and hours, allowing the drawings to emerge in intricate detail over time. The small scale of the works and the negative space of the paper becomes part of the power of the drawing, heightening the immersive experience of the composition.
Kirrily graduated with a Bachelor of Visual Arts (Honours) from the Australian National University in 2016, having studied on exchange at the École Nationale Supérieure des Beaux-Arts, Paris in 2014. Since her graduation, her works have been exhibited in Canberra, New South Wales and the Northern Territory with successful shows at Sydney Contemporary Beaver Galleries in 2017, 2018, 2021 and 2022. Kirrily was a finalist in the 2019 and 2023 Hazelhurst Art on Paper Awards.
