Bio | Harry Culy
Harry Culy on a shoot, image by Molly Tompkins
Listen to Harry being interviewed by Lynn Freeman on RNZ Standing room only
Born 1986
Lives and works in Te Whanganui-a-Tara, Wellington
Culy’s practice comes from an urgent desire to record the world around him. He often works on long term projects that span a number of years, frequently returning to places and communities that he has a personal connection to. He uses this process to examine everyday contemporary life in both Australia and Aotearoa New Zealand through photography.
Culy works predominantly with large-format film photographs, and within the expanded documentary photography tradition. However his approach is not journalistic, rather it is lyrical and personal, embracing the ambiguity inherent within the medium, allowing gaps for our own reading.
Each image Culy takes is a pause amid an intensive, wandering process. This process produces enigmatic photographs found within daily life, often including vacant interiors, stark portraits, and landscapes — which may hint at narratives beyond the picture plane. His work is influenced by the Antipodean Gothic art movement.
He says of this movement, “I don’t exactly know why I’m interested in this type of work… I think I am subconsciously drawn to it. It’s difficult to describe, but it draws on Freud’s notion of the ‘Uncanny’. I have spent a lot of time going down the rabbit hole, researching, reading books, watching films, looking at ‘gothic’ painting and art – looking at ideas behind the gothic — like the post-colonial discourse, and the way it works on a psychological level. I guess I’m drawn to the feeling it gives me, especially with everyday life... More than anything it’s a feeling of being unsettled, of uneasiness, of anxiety. That feeling seems to echo my relationship to Aotearoa and my own sense of ‘home’.”
Culy completed his Master of Fine Arts at Toi Rauwhārangi College of Creative Arts, Massey University Wellington, in 2020. He has exhibited across New Zealand and Australia over the last 5 years. In 2021 he received an Arts Foundation Laureate award receiving the Marti Friedlander Photographic Award.
His recent exhibitions include News From The Sun at City Gallery Wellington 2019-2020, Mirror City at Jhana Millers Gallery in 2020, The Gap at Parlour Projects 2018, I can see for miles at the Contemporary Centre for Photography Melbourne, 2018, and Rose Hill as part of Projects 2018 at the Auckland Art Fair.
Alongside his photography work, Culy runs a small press photobook company called Bad News Books.
Education
Master of Fine Arts Toi Rauwhārangi College of Creative Arts, Massey University Wellington
Bachelor of Design (Photography) with first class Honours, Massey University Wellington
Exhibitions
2021
The Right Place?, Auckland Art Fair, Jhana Millers
2020
Mirror City, Jhana Millers, Te Whanganui-a-Tara, Wellington
2019
News from the Sun (with Shaun Waugh and Justine Varga), City Gallery Wellington, Te Whanganui-a-Tara, Wellington
Nobody Believe you (Bad luck), Jhana Millers, Te Whanganui-a-Tara, Wellington
The Garden, Precinct 35, Te Whanganui-a-Tara, Wellington
Altered Visions, China Heights, Sydney
2018
Blue Room (with Lucy O’Doherty), Jhana Millers, Te Whanganui-a-Tara, Wellington
The Gap, Parlour Projects, Te Matau-a-Māui, Hawkes Bay
Projects, Auckland Art Fair, The Cloud, Tāmaki Makaurau, Auckland
I can see for miles, Contemporary Centre for Photography Melbourne
CLIP Award Exhibition, Perth Centre for Photography, Perth
2017
Rose Hill, Parlour Projects, Te Matau-a-Māui, Hawkes Bay
Evidence (with Sam Stephenson), China Heights, Sydney
LCE4, Lilac City Studio, Sydney
Pink Bits, Precinct 35, Te Whanganui-a-Tara, Wellington
2016
The Gap, Precinct 35, Te Whanganui-a-Tara, Wellington
The Big Nowhere, with Max Scott Murray and Robyn Daly, GOJA, Bangkok, Thailand
Sky Colours, with Robyn Daly, Australia
Gaffa Photo Festival, Gaffa Gallery, Sydney
2014
By the Wayside, Photospace Gallery, Te Whanganui-a-Tara, Wellington
Curation
Where the River Bends, In Situ x Ilam, Ōtautahi, Christchurch
Ectoplasm, Green Street Gallery, Te Whanganui-a-Tara, Wellington
Awards
2021 Arts Foundation Laureate receiving the Marti Friedlander Photographic Award
Peter Turner Scholarship in documentary photography, 2018
RT Emerging Artists Award, 2016, NZ
Reviews and Essays
Story 79: Harry Culy, Nowhere Diary. Read here
Family Practice, ArtZone, February 2021. Read here
Under the black hood, ArtZone, June 2019. Read here
Take me back, ArtZone, October 2018. Read here
News from the Sun, exhibition catalogue. Read here
News from the sun, Art News New Zealand, 2020. Read here
News from the sun reviewed, Photoforum. Read here
Meet the Culys, Index magazine. Read here
Bad News Books – an interview, Photofroum, August 2018. Read here
Palmstudios, Feature — Harry Culy. Read here
The heavy collective — Harry Culy and San Stephenson, Evidence. Read Here
Harry Culy on Antipodean Gothic, thisonthat.org. Read here
Time, being and Harry Culy, Art New Zealand, Winter 2017. Read here
Seconds Magazine, issue 6, 2016 (NZ)
Blow Up Photography Annual, issue 1, 2014 (Aus)
Massive Magazine, issue 6, 2013 (NZ)