QUEENSLAND.- In a new exhibition, leading Queensland artist Scott Redford explores surf and pop culture through new and recent works, including many attributed to the fictional persona of Reinhardt Dammn.

The major exhibition of paintings, sculptures and videos ‘Scott Redford: Introducing Reinhardt Dammn’ shows at the Queensland Art Gallery from November 19, 2010 to March 13, 2011.

Queensland Art Gallery Director Tony Ellwood said the exhibition celebrated Redford’s intelligent and passionate investigation of surf and pop culture, especially relevant to the Gold Coast where he was born.

‘Audiences will encounter an extensive display of Redford’s colourful surfboard sculptures, videos, model motel signage and vibrant acrylic paintings on canvas.’

‘The exhibition introduces Redford’s fictional archetype, Reinhardt Dammn, a rebellious young surfer, rock musician and artist through whom he explores the beauty and energy of contemporary pop culture and young people, especially surfers.’

Mr Ellwood said Redford was a leading mid-career artist, whose work was thought provoking and deliberately accessible.

‘Redford engages with the ideas of post-Pop art and glossy, contemporary surf culture. His work considers the paraphernalia and cultural references of surfing, and refers to modernist aesthetics as well as contemporary design, architecture, advertising and cinema. For this exhibition, Redford has made a number of major new works, including his creation Reinhardt Dammn’s own studio.

‘Included in the exhibition are three four-metre long polar bear figures to be installed in the Queensland Art Gallery’s Watermall, installations constructed from found broken surfboards and several sculptures that propose grandiose and intriguing public signage for the Gold Coast and Surfers Paradise.

‘Gallery visitors will be familiar with Redford’s 10-metre high sculpture, The High/Perpetual Xmas No Abstraction, located outside the Gallery of Modern Art, which references 1960s motel signage.This work has become an iconic landmark between the Gallery’s two sites,’ he said.

‘The works Redford makes for the fictional archetype Reinhardt Dammn are props that will be used in a proposed feature film about the character that the artist is currently writing.

‘With the character of Reinhardt Dammn and his film, Redford takes his project to a logical conclusion by merging it with popular cinema. He invites the audience to participate in the Reinhardt Dammn narrative, to add their own embellishments to the story and imagine him in their own way.’