Rob White – “The Swimming Pool Series”

Anyone who pays any attention to art knows of David Hockneys’ 1967 painting “A Bigger Splash”. A tan diving board jutting diagonally from the foreground, a minimalist modern house simply rendered in monochromatic geometric blocks of colour in the background, 2 spindly palms to the right. The center of attention the worked brush stroke explosion depicting the splash of the title. Hockney took up permanent residence in L.A, in 1976, where the swimming pool is ubiquitous.

Rob White hails from New Zealand where there are roughly 40,000 private residences with pools. One can imagine the possible effect this may have had on White in his most recent works - “The Swimming Pool Series”. One cannot help but think of Hockneys’
claim on the iconography that defined his oeuvre

However, whereas Hockneys’ paintings are typically peopled with swimmers or
sunbathers lounging poolside, filled with the depiction of human action, the splash of a dive, the ripple of water from a swimmer, with the exception of “Skinny Dip” Whites’ constucts are devoid of human habitation.

The methodically built-up layers of paint & varnish, the carefully composed rectangles of azure and aqua initially convey a sense of calm and languor. As the works straddle the divide between painting and sculpture, with the bas relief surfaces and the carefully crafted poolside furniture meticulously placed , so too these works straddle the demarcation of life & death.

The dearth of humanity is post-apocalyptic. Whites bucolic poolscapes capture the immediate aftershock of absence.

In “Perfect Day” the canvas deck chairs wait expectantly for occupants that never arrive. So too, the beach ball in “Waiting to Play” a paradox of cheerful colours and forlorn fate of forever waiting. “SK8” depicts human activity in the portrayal of graffiti on an empty pool surface. The last desperate acts of vandalism on the empty pool husk, spray paint on the concrete shell of a grave already dug.

The demise of humanity as the pool filter keeps humming, the recently added chemical solution keeping the algae at bay ...for now. In “Global Swim” that algae has the last laugh as it archly depicts a map of a world that once was. Even the life preserver in “Float” is uselessly adrift
with no body to save, the last donut abandoned in the blue vastness of a suburban deep fryer .

And of the single work with a body depicted? In “Skinny Dip” the body floats face down, arms at their side, no action, no evidence of a swimming motion , – stricken with whatever deadly malady ( fill in the blank here) as they dove into their eternal butterfly, or breast stroke or dog paddle.

White proclaims on his website :

He may well think so, however, one can’t help but think his latest works are reflecting pools of exactly that uncertain and chaotic world .

I believe that in an uncertain and chaotic world, we all need to remember simple

moments of play and joy. My art creates portals for you to calmly soar above or

swim freely to wherever your imagination takes you.

Ben Smit