Pete Gurrie - 'Code'
Wednesday 11 - Sunday 29 September 2013
'This is, excitedly, my first exhibition. This comes as a relief, as I have amassed a large volume of work since leaving VCA some 20 years ago where I trained as a printmaker.
This show Code is a direct result of the path I have travelled to get to this point, and can only have been created by blending my two worlds. As partner in a data analytics and marketing agency, I interact with and shape experiences using code and data, however I never fail to see the rough beauty in what is a very literal and functional language.
This interest emerged some time ago when I began to collect the postscript errors which spat out of my cantankerous HP laser printer. Their decorative qualities fascinated me.
The work in this show plays with the physical attributes and language of code, drawing attention to the pattern and rhythm which naturally emerges from something which requires a distinct order and language of its own to function. Each piece contains an abstract story which uses the instructional language of the code to pose foreboding or humorous if not cynical ponderings.
The process begins deliberately in a simple text editing program, where the limitations of the program and the courier system font set their own constraints on the work.
The final part of the process uses an acetone transfer process, which forces what has been heavily structured and strict, to become organic, soft, unpredictable and unstructured.'
Pete Gurrie, August 2013