To commence our 2025 gallery programme and begin the second Aotearoa International Festival Of Secret Sounds, we are delighted to present ANAGRAMMA, a new exhibition by Victor Meertens and Alexis Ensor.

Of the project, Victor observes:

ANAGRAMMA
Is an improvised deconstruction & reinvention set play,
Aim is to reveal a Libretto, Score or Lyric sheet.

Born in 1955 to Dutch immigrants in Seymour Victoria, Australia, Victor did a BA in Fine Art Painting at Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology, graduating in 1979; then postgrad at Victorian College of the Arts in 1984. In the four decades since, Victor has dedicated himself to the elevation of discarded parts and offcuts as primary materials for making. Exhibiting paintings, sculptures and collages at numerous galleries since 1985, his works give voice to the potent qualities of such materials, consisting as both formal and conceptual potential.

Through his performative work with the Charles Ives Singers (among others), Meertens’ impassioned vocalisation foregrounds the human: the labour that has traditionally been a central component in the manufacture and demolition of structures that still bear witness to the manual marks of maintenance and renovation. In recent making, Victor has employed “sound cancelling” material in the form of felt acoustic panels in a range of bright, primary colours. The generation of and interest in offcuts remains, the colour in conflict with the monochrome is no clear reveal, creating uncertainty.

His work is held in many significant public collections including National Gallery Victoria, Melbourne, National Gallery of Australia, Canberra, Queensland Art Gallery, Brisbane, Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney, Auckland Art Gallery – Toi o Tāmaki, MUMA, Melbourne, Ballarat Art Gallery, as well as many private collections in NZ, Australia, USA, Germany & Romania.

For more information, see: https://garlandmag.com/article/victor-meertens-off-cuts/

Exhibition opens: Wednesday 12 February, 5.30pm, with refreshments by Liberty Breweries
Hours: 12 – 4pm, Tuesday – Saturday
Closes: Saturday 8 March

For more on the AIFOSS, go here