
Kerrie Poliness
Biography
Born Melbourne, Australia 1962
Lives and works in Melbourne
Kerrie Poliness is known for her rule-based painting and drawing works that revisit the ideas and practices of conceptual art. Her wall drawings are installed by groups of participants, allowing each individual’s own processes of interpretation and decision-making to inflect the final outcome.
The artist’s Wall Drawings challenge the defining concepts of an artwork as a unique object. Each drawing is a unique work of art that relies on the interpretation of a set of instructions that relies on architectural circumstance as well as the variables of hand and material execution. The drawings are site specific and are different in each location they appear. They activate the space and visually challenge the spatial perceptions and assumptions of the viewer.
Exhibitions include: Field Drawing #1, HOTA, Gold Coast (2018); Every Brilliant Eye: Australian Art of the 1990s, National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne (2017); Landscape Paintings (Lake Bolac and Zagreb) and Wave Drawings (orange and green), G‑MK, Zagreb (2014); Trace: Performance and its Documents, Queensland Art Gallery & Gallery of Modern Art, Brisbane (2014); Wall works, Arts Lifts, National Gallery of Australia, Canberra (2014); Melbourne Now, National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne (2013); Kerrie Poliness: Black O, Dowse Art Museum, Lower Hutt, New Zealand (2013); Australian Contemporary Drawing 2, University of London (2012); Red Matter Wall Drawings 1 — 3, Kovacka 3 gallery, Dubrovnik (1997); Black O Wall Drawings 3 & 4, Gallerie St. Toma, Museum of the City of Rovinj, Istria (1997); and Wall Drawing #1, Phoenix Hotel, San Francisco (1995).
Poliness has developed a number of site-specific public artworks including: Field Drawing #1, Maywar Green, Gallery of Modern Art, Brisbane (2014); Wave Drawings, Highpoint Shopping Centre, Melbourne (2013); Field Drawing #1, The Agora, Latrobe University, Melbourne; and installations of the Black O Wall Drawings at the Monash University Library, Melbourne (1998) and the Government Superannuation Building, Melbourne (2000).
Public collections include the National Gallery of Australia, Canberra; Museum of Contemporary Art Australia, Sydney; National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne; Queensland Art Gallery & Gallery of Modern Art, Brisbane; Heide Museum of Modern Art, Melbourne; and Dowse Museum, Lower Hutt.
Exhibitions

Kerrie Poliness
Stream

Kerrie Poliness
Parliament Steps Walking Drawing
6th – 6th February 2021
Australian Centre for Contemporary Art

Kerrie Poliness, Rose Nolan, Stephen Bram
Poliness, Nolan, Bram
20th September – 1st November 2014
Anna Schwartz Gallery Carriageworks

Kerrie Poliness
Blue Wall Drawing
3rd August – 1st September 2007
Anna Schwartz Gallery
Available Works

Kerrie Poliness
Parliament Steps Walking Drawing, 2021
chalk drawing
dimensions variable
Commissioned by the Australian Centre for Contemporary Art, Melbourne
Presented in association with UPTOWN, and as part of ‘Who’s Afraid of Public Space?’
Photo: Andrew Curtis

Kerrie Poliness
SMOB, 2020
silver, magenta, orange and blue matte graphic film on wall
dimensions variable, minimum wall size 250 x 600 cm
Edition of 10
installation view, 5 x walls, Footscray

Kerrie Poliness
Wooden Drawing (BBKO 1), 2018
ink, gouche, balsa
70 cm (diameter)

Kerrie Poliness
OMG, 2014
wall drawing instruction book
dimensions variable

Kerrie Poliness
snowprint #11, 2008
acrylic sheet
100 x 100 cm

Kerrie Poliness
snowprint #17, 2008
acrylic sheet
100 x 100 cm

Kerrie Poliness
snowprint #12, 2008
acrylic sheet
100 x 100 cm

Kerrie Poliness
Black 0 Wall Drawings, 1997
chalk, marker pen
dimensions variable
Open edition
Library

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