Acclaimed Australian artist Tim Maguire has taken the printing process to the core of his work as a painter, making both figurative and abstract paintings using the layering of colour according to the conventional method of commercial colour printing. For Ikon he produced new works, based on photographs and video; huge digital prints which were hung unframed directly onto the gallery walls. Depicting fragments of still-lifes and landscapes – specifically, flowers and falling snow – these sumptuous images celebrate the ethereal nature of beauty. In addition the exhibition included a series of smaller photographs and a video capturing the movement of water through the superimposition of separated pure colours.

Through his work, Maguire conveys the means by which it is made. Intrigued by recent developments in digital printing he has explored in depth the opportunities offered by the medium. The new prints, for example, translate photographic imagery into paintings in oil and solvents which are then scanned athigh resolution to make computer files. Subsequently converted digitally from black-and white to their appropriate primary colours, they are fused into striking configurations of secondary colours. Maguire’s technical inventiveness results in a range of hues unobtainable in other kinds of print making, as well as the possibility for making prints on a monumental scale.

Not only their size but also the installation of Maguire’s ‘snow’ prints, in particular, are deliberate allusions to Claude Monet’s Waterlilies paintings in the Orangerie, Paris. Likewise, informed by scientific colour theory, they convey a sheer joy derived from the visible world.

A fully illustrated catalogue, including installation photographs accompanied this exhibition. Tim Maguire has also produced a limited edition print Starnbergersee which is available from Ikon Shop.

Snow, water and flowers was kindly supported by the Australian Government through the Australia Council for the Arts, the School of Art, Birmingham City University and The Chantelune Fund.