Shelter
Firstdraft, Sydney.
May 23rd - July 5th 2025
Documentation by Jessica Maurer & Grace Harré
'Kek kek kek-kek-kek-kek-kek (Kingfisher house,)' 2025 Oak, messmate, red gum, blue gum, birch, stringy bark, ash, wattle, spotted gum.
'Cage,' 2025. Oil on organza with salvaged hardwood support. 113 x 82 cm
'Kek kek kek-kek-kek-kek (Dollarbird house),' 2025 Oak, messmate, red gum, blue gum, birch, stringy bark, ash, wattle, spotted gum.
'Tree Guard,' 2025 Oil on organza with salvaged hardwood and timber inlay support.
'Hole,' 2025. Salvaged hardwood veneers with salvaged hardwood support (Marquetry.) 113 × 82 cm
Kek kek kek-kek-kek-kek (Dollarbird house), 2025 Oak, messmate, red gum, blue gum, birch, stringy bark, ash, wattle, spotted gum.
Kek kek kek-kek-kek-kek (Dollarbird house), 2025 Oak, messmate, red gum, blue gum, birch, stringy bark, ash, wattle, spotted gum.
'Chit chit chut-pwink pwink (Rosella house),' 2025 Oak, messmate, red gum, blue gum, birch, stringy bark, ash, wattle, spotted gum.
'Kek kek kek-kek-kek-kek (Dollarbird house),' 2025 Oak, messmate, red gum, blue gum, birch, stringy bark, ash, wattle, spotted gum.
'Bird Hide,' 2025 Oil on organza with salvaged hardwood and timber inlay support 113 x 82 cm
Install view: 'Care,' and 'Kek kek kek-kek-kek-kek (Dollarbird house.)'
'Care' 2025 Oil on board and organza; timber inlay and salvaged hardwood support
Detail: 'Care' 2025
'Skee-arrr (Barn owl house),' 2025 Oak, messmate, red gum, blue gum, birch, stringy bark, ash, wattle, spotted gum.
Detail: 'Care' 2025
Detail: 'Kek kek kek-kek-kek-kek-kek (Kingfisher house.)'
Detail: Kek kek kek-kek-kek-kek-kek (Kingfisher house.)
'Kek kek kek-kek-kek-kek (Dollarbird house),' 2025 Oak, messmate, red gum, blue gum, birch, stringy bark, ash, wattle, spotted gum.
Detail: 'Kek kek kek-kek-kek-kek (Dollarbird house), 2025'
Detail: 'Skee-arrr (Barn owl house)
Detail: 'Kek kek kek-kek-kek-kek-kek (Kingfisher house.)' - (After De Chirico.)
Naoise Halloran-Mackay explores ideas of shelter and the ways in which we may build, seek, or offer it.
Blending imagery reminiscent of real estate advertisements, 1970s DIY construction manuals, grandiose Renaissance palazzos, and homes he has lived in or helped build, Naoise conveys illusionary space through the construction of decorative facades that blur the line between the familiar and the distant.In his translucent paintings on sheer organza, internal supports that would typically be concealed beneath the surface are exposed and reimagined as part of the composition, bringing together image and object and anchoring the works in an architectural framework. Alongside these sit a series of sculptural ‘nest boxes’ clad in natural hardwood veneers. At the conclusion of the exhibition, these boxes will be placed in trees as surrogates for hollows lost to development, offering shelter to wildlife.
Naoise is drawn to the irony of these boxes: crafted from trees, now reassembled to fulfil the same role they once naturally served. This cycle of extraction, abstraction, and return reflects a broader detachment from the origins of materials, and a sheltering from the ecological costs of our aesthetic desires.