Andrew Farquhar has painted since 1982. He trained at Massey University / Palmerston North Teachers College under the guidance of Sculptor Paul Dibble and taught practical art until March 2006. He now paints full-time from his studio in Matua, Tauranga, New Zealand. Andrew has exhibited throughout the Bay of Plenty and Waikato, and Palmerston North. He did not exhibit for three years 2003-05 due to ill health but resumed his career in 2006. In 2010, Andrew completed a Post-Graduate Diploma in Art & Design, continuing into 2012 he completed a Master of Art and Design at AUT, Auckland
Andrew is strongly influenced by 'light-as-surface' painters such as Edward Chell, Felim Egan, Mark Rothko and Rosa M Hessling. Max Kozloff used the phrase 'Light-as-Surface' (ArtForum January 1968) to group artists working to juxtapose the finite object-hood of the work with a simultaneous sense of immateriality and transcendence.
His early works were very realistic, after which he moved into several years of expressive figurative works - influenced by Terry Winters. He explored minimalism briefly, becoming interested in the idea Nachume Miller proposed of 'putting everything back into the zero point'. He then worked with encaustic for a period as it allowed him to explore transparency versus opacity but the erratic nature of the medium eventually gave way to the immediacy of acrylic. After a few attempts at working in acrylic to model the encaustic works (and the frustration of changing medium after nearly 20 years of working in oils) he developed a more geometrical structure. View artist Curriculum Vitae
