300 words for an exhibition next July at Fresh.

I have what might be called a Love/ Hate relationship with Art though it's never really veers into hate, well, it never does, but it does go well into not caring much.

What that means is that I never stop being artistic, as such, I do very much stop caring about having a career in Art especially when I go into territories which could only be called craft and even into what might be called restoration.

I think what it is is that first and foremost I love stuff and how it relates to us as humans in the world we are constantly recreating around ourselves and Art, as a career, can be a part of that for me but it's merely a tool and not a product or end in and of itself. And that stuff, whatever it may be, always has a story. It either came to me with a story already told that I might frame and re-appraise in some way or it is in need of a story and, for me, that seems to be the all-encompassing life that is an Artful life. It's not the end product being sold in a gallery that be added to a CV, even though that's part of it, it's me on this planet, in this body, living in this country and finding ways to be best at what I do and passing those insights and discoveries around for discussion and review so that we all might find better ways of making this life, we all share, enjoyable and interesting.

So fads in the Art world have no real consequence to me. Yes they can be invigorating and inspiring and I'm more than willing to steal what I need but in the day to day experience of my life they're just like anything else on the periphery, mildly entertaining but essentially reasonably remote to what I see and feel everyday.

Maybe then it's that my whole life is my own fad. I am my own fashion which is the sum total of the places I've been, the people who are there and what they do within there own lives. So I guess that's what I want this exhibition to be about. That I am a man brought up and living in South Auckland who has decided to do it my way and at this time in my life, and always recurring, is a love of furniture. My pallet to tell stories of the past finding its future, through the now that is always of the greatest importance, is that of the things we use to sit on, store things in and place possibly more important things on. It's like making art of the frame, being a bit hidy hidy about what I'm actually saying, hiding in plain site.

And what will I be saying with a few scratch built pieces of furniture, a bunch of experimental works made up from discarded chairs and tabled pieced together with extras and some high end stuff redone from 60's and 70's South Auckland sitting room classics... and a few paintings done with spiritual discovery in mind?

I'll be saying thankyou to South Auckland for constantly inspiring me to live here and, guess what, we have a totally unique view of life and we need to remember that, not only is it more than enough to be proud of, but it's also more than enough for more conservative and richer places to start seeing us as the rich and diverse culture that we have.