Paddy O'Rourke: 100s of Years

In his new work, Paddy O’Rourke uses various mark making and dark room development techniques, continuing his investigation into and manipulation of the formal properties of the photographic medium. The resulting camera-less pictures merge contemporary and historical imagery sourced from both popular and high culture to create bizarre, open ended and ambiguous narratives.

These works are underpinned by a surreal element; the result of discrepancies between techniques, content, contexts and forms. O’Rourke is interested in temporal issues and how past, present and future can be conflated to exist all at once in an art work. He also explores surface in all senses of the word: as image on a substrate and as a reference to myths of identity and history.

Paddy O’Rourke gained a Bachelor of Visual Arts degree from AUT in 2000.