James Dignan - Art 2001

An interest in the work of Georgio de Chirico leads to an attempt to capture the same kind of sense of impending architecture. Not quite monochrome, but toned rather than truly coloured.

A first attempt at collage - 940 British stamps forming one giant stamp. The title is a pun on the name of the designer of the stamps, known to collectors as Machin Definitives.

My first work on stretched canvas is a view across the Anderson's Bay inlet looking towards Dunedin's city centre. Originally intended to be in colour, small hints of blue and cream still peep through the essentially monochromatic finish.

This building is on the beachfront less than half a mile from where I live in Dunedin, and only 100 metres from the structure that was the subject of Fragments of a rainy season.

An old photo (circa 1978) of a friend of mine using a phone box late at night was digitally manipulated to provide a model for this painting. My first "tone separation" painting.

A photo of Dunedin's main street, treated with methods identical to Calling from a country phone.

Jessica was one of the regular models at the life drawing classes run by the Otago Art Society (which I have been attending on and off since about 2001). She is also the subject of several other pen studies done during 2001 and 2002.

The above-ground structure of the Strongman Coal Mine, on the South Island's West Coast.

A view along Princes Street, Dunedin, on a wet night.

A distant view of Mt. Hikurangi, on the east coast of NZ's North Island. Hikurangi is sacred to the Ngati Porou Maori, hence the painting's name, which translates as 'Sacred vision'.

A view of NZ's Southern Alps, from the main road to Mt. Cook (Aoraki).