After more than five amazing years in Glebe it is with mixed emotions that we announce Salerno Gallery will be moving to a new space. Glebe has been absolutely wonderful […]
Peregrine – Anton Pulvirenti
5th – 28th April, 2012
Opening Night:
Thursday 5th April, 6.00 – 8.00pm
Following the sell-out success of “Lagomorpha” in 2011, Anton Pulvirenti returns to Salerno Gallery for his first solo show of 2012. The body of works exhibited for his new exhibition entitled Peregrine moves between sovereign theory, symbolist revelation and memories of wartime internment. The representational drawings examine the underside narratives of the wartime experience through the figure of the “animal-man”, to mediate present and past cultural memory. In particular, it symbolises for the artist the complexity of the Italian-Australian migratory experience.
The figure resides between the animal and human, reflecting gaps in memories of the past. The displacement between animal and human takes its cues from the experiences of the artist’s grandfather, interned as an enemy alien in Loveday camp, South Australia during World War Two. The experience has been particularly important for the artist, forming the wellspring of creative output over the last decade.
Pulvirenti’s highly rendered works derive from his experiences in Italy under the tutelage of an Sicilian carriage painting master in 2004. Anton is currently completing a PHD at Sydney University called Wartime Camps: Family, Memory and Symbolism. Recently, the artist also works with refugees both in Villawood DC and community detention, conducting art classes.