John Z. Robinson

John Z. Robinson, photographed in 2008.

John Z. Robinson (born 25 May 1953 in Foxton, New Zealand) is a New Zealand painter, printmaker, and jeweller. He has lived in Dunedin, New Zealand since 1978.

Robinson completed a manufacturing jewellery apprenticeship with Max Wilson in Palmerston North in 1973. From 1978 to 1980, he attended Otago Polytechnic School of Art in Dunedin where he was tutored in painting by Walden Tucker and the English-born artist Bernard Holman. He graduated with a Diploma in Fine Arts and returned to complete Honours in 1996.

Robinson has worked as a designer, jeweller, painter, print-maker and sculptor. He is a colourist whose paintings (acrylic) and prints (linocut) are primarily figurative[1] though his prints often focus entirely on words, frequently with punning intent. His paintings tend to be impressionistic, whether they be landscapes and townscapes[2] or portraits.[3]

Robinson's paintings and prints have been exhibited throughout New Zealand and works are included in the collections of the Hocken Collections, Te Manawa, the Rotorua Museum and the Wallace Arts Trust. Robinson was awarded the William Hodges Fellowship and was artist-in-residence at the Southland Museum and Art Gallery in Invercargill in 1998. In 2006, the Port Gallery in Port Chalmers featured a retrospective of thirty years of his work in a show entitled John Z Robinson. A Survey of Paintings and Prints.

Amongst Robinson's many commissions have been set designs for theatrical productions of Entertaining Mr Sloane, School for Scandal, The Pearl Fishers and Twelfth Night, and book cover designs for Caclin (Lincoln University), Canzona, When Two Men Embrace: The New Zealand Anthology of Lesbian and Gay Poetry, SPORT 7, and The Journal of New Zealand Literature.

Robinson has exhibited his paintings in Otaru in Japan and in New York City and his jewellery has been shown in Australia, Japan, New Zealand, and the United States, most notably at the Bead International in Athens, Ohio in 2000. From 18 August 2007 until 21 February 2010, his jewellery featured in an exhibition entitled The Scots in New Zealand at the Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa in Wellington.

Robinson's painting and print work featured in two books published in 2003 and 2004 respectively, being Other Men's Flowers. Portraits by John Z. Robinson, which concentrates on close up portraits of men, each paired with a painting of a flower, and Lake Warhola Soup - The Word-Prints of J. Z. Robinson, which focuses entirely on Robinson's punning monochromatic linocuts.

In December 2007, Longacre Press published Parallel Lines: Riding the Central Otago Rail Trail which included paintings of Central Otago by Robinson together with poetry by Annie Villiers.

Three books featuring Robinson’s drawings and paintings were published in 2008 and 2009 – John Z. Robinson’s ‘The Dream of Endymion’, Amy Bock – A Series of Drawings by John Z. Robinson and The Male Figure in the Art of John Z. Robinson.

A book entitled Red Studio: Forty-Five Prints was published by Longacre Press in October 2009 and celebrates Robinson's print-making career. The forty-five prints, mostly linocuts, were selected from a collection of simple but expressive prints. With an introduction by novelist Laurence Fearnley, the book is an intimate portrait of the artist's development.

A survey of Robinson's paintings was held at the TSB Bank Wallace Arts Centre in Auckland in 2013. This exhibition coincided with the publication of a further book entitled J. Z. Robinson. Paintings which contains a comprehensive overview of his painting career.

In 2015, Ravenwood Press published April by Annie Villiers and Robinson. The book contains a poetic narrative by Villiers and drawings by Robinson which reflect on the transition from late summer to early winter, in particular as it evolves in the south. Anzac Day and reflections on the place of Gallipoli in the April journey become part of the narrative through drawings and words.

Robinson was one of twenty-six artists invited by the Department of Conservation to travel to Tamatea (Dusky Sound) in winter 2014 and summer 2015. Their task was to connect people to the area and offer a window into a largely unseen environment. In a response to his experience, Robinson produced a set of six sterling silver spoons tagged with Department of Conservation bird tags and two lino cuts. These were shown as part of a group exhibition entitled Tamatea. Art and Conservation in Dusky Sound at Bowen House in Wellington in November and December 2016 and at the Southland Museum and Art Gallery in Invercargill in December 2016 to February 2017.

Art exhibitions

1980–1990

Solo exhibitions

1991–2000

Solo exhibitions

2001–2010

Solo exhibitions

2011–

Solo exhibitions

Jewellery exhibitions

2000–2010

Solo exhibitions

Articles and reviews

1980–1990

1991–2000

2001–2010

References

  1. ↑ McGahey 2000, p. 213,
  2. ↑ Dignan, J., Memento mori, in Otago Daily Times, 7 December 2006.
  3. ↑ Dignan, J., Flowers and masculinity prove a potent mix, in Otago Daily Times, 4 September 2003.

Bibliography

External links

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