Elliot Love
Nissan Navara Wreck // Dunedin Wharf
Oil on Canvas
785 x 635 mm
$8,500
Available
Painting size 750 x 595mm | Framed size 785 x 635mm
In ‘Nissan Navara Wreck // Dunedin Wharf,’ Elliot Love turns the overlooked into the extraordinary. Every line, every shadow, every subtle nuance is considered; Love never leaves a small detail to chance.
The painting explores light, geometry, and decay, capturing a backlit scene where much of his subject matter recedes into shadow, and muted tones dominate. The intersection of the two roofs occurs almost precisely in the middle of the composition, drawing the eye down to the stranded, wrecked truck at its heart. The meeting point of the two building facades serves as a vertical anchor; aligned according to the golden ratio, a timeless principle of balance and harmony found in nature and utilised in art. At the same time, a single sunlit gutter punctuates the subdued palette.
Vertical lines, from the fence to the corrugated iron, meet horizontal elements such as the garage door to create balance, while the graffiti, rusting metal, and flat tyre tell a story of prolonged neglect. Yet, through Love’s precise, considered eye, the mundane becomes compelling, and the forgotten is transformed into something subtly dramatic.
Artist Bio
Elliot Love is a contemporary painter living in Auckland, New Zealand.
Nostalgia is inherent in these acutely observed depictions of Love’s obsessive interest in cars of the 1980’s and 90’s, all set within a city’s still and lifeless streets. Working in both oil and acrylic on canvas, often on an unusually small scale, Love’s beautifully rendered compositions present delightful mysteries and provoke inspection, with an invitation to linger within his finely detailed architectural landscapes.
Equal attention is given to light; the humming glow of a street lamp, a glint reflecting off the boot of the car, or shadows brought by dusk. With no people present, the paintings evoke a sense we are here in secret observation of stillness and subject, a car belonging to someone else’s life: Are we alone? Who does this car belong to and where are they now?