Ghetto Kitty

After years of busking on Melbourne’s streets, Pheelix’s first major solo-show was at McCulloch Gallery (now Broodbox) in 2005. Since then he has had numerous solo and group-shows, collaborated on several projects, and curated & promoted emerging artists and spaces. This show was the culmination of the last few years researching and digesting two of paintings most well known figures, who shared not only a friendship but died in the same year: Francis Bacon (1909-1992) and Brett Whiteley (1939-1992).

Both comical and contemplative, this series of original works is not purely analytical or academic- but playful and personal, and aims to discuss ‘influence’ in contemporary arts-practice.

Artist Statement:

Francis Bacon famously remarked to Brett Whiteley at the opening of his ‘Christie-series’ in 1965,
“You use me the way I use Velásquez...”
There is a grand tradition of artists reacting and rebounding off each other throughout history, not just in style and substance but directly referencing and re-mixing imagery.
I believe we are all enveloped in a collage- not in an academic sense but personally, physically, creatively and socially. My blend is of the spray-can and the past…
Oils, illustration, construction and conversation.
This body of work is not simply visual essays on these prominent artists; but more about my long-term digestion of their influence and a reflection on myself, as just another cog in the on-going Armageddon of now.

We all make history.