• Hello-Goodbye.jpg

    Ronnie van Hout Hello, Goodbye, 2002. Image courtesy of the artist.

  • Monkey-Self-Dog.jpg

    Ronnie van Hout Monkey Madness, Self-Portrait, Sculp D. Dog, 2001. Image courtesy of the artist.

  • MONSTER.jpg

    Ronnie van Hout Monster, 1999. Image courtesy of the artist.

  • Sick-Chimp.jpg

    Ronnie van Hout Sick Chimp, 2002. Image courtesy of Ivan Anthony Gallery, Auckland and the artist.

Ronnie van Hout: I've Abandoned Me

29 August - 28 November 2004 in the Entire Gallery
I’ve Abandoned Me samples the diverse practice of one of New Zealand’s liveliest and most irreverent artists: Ronnie van Hout. With scepticism and humour, van Hout engages with one of the central themes of contemporary art—‘the construction of identity’.

A touring exhibition from the Dunedin Public Art Gallery, I’ve Abandoned Me explores van Hout’s career-long reckoning with self-portraiture. Since art school, van Hout has been making works that ask ‘What does it mean to be yourself?’, and using doppelgangers, stand-ins, sly substitutions and sight-gags in his investigation of this question. As exhibition curator Justin Paton says, “Ronnie van Hout is making an exhibition of himself.”

With work included in major New Zealand exhibitions including City Gallery Wellington's own Telecom Prospect 2004: New Art New Zealand, Ronnie van Hout is now consolidating his international profile. He is currently working in Berlin on a Creative New Zealand international residency programme at the Künstlerhaus Bethanien.

I’ve Abandoned Me brings together works from the full extent of van Hout’s practice: sculpture, photography, moving image, model-making and even the odd embroidery. There are paintings that mimic corny t-shirts, silver suits for extra-terrestrials, miniature model families, and everywhere the image of the artist – latex casts of van Hout’s head, video projections of his face, and manifestations of his alter-egos, Sculp D. Dog and Monkey Madness. Don’t miss this chance to meet Ronnie van Hout (or at least someone who looks like him...)

Public Programmes

Curator Tour : Ronnie van Hout -The Fall Guy
Presented by Justin Paton.

Floortalk: Ronnie van Hout
Presented by Jim Barr.

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