Ack

Peter Robinson's work is historically known for its critical exploration on issues of identity and ethnicity. Originally trained as a sculptor, Robinson's work expands beyond sculpture into drawing, painting and other media. In the 1990's Robinson's work used traditional Maori patterns and design elements as a starting point to consciously respond to eminent politics of the time. With an air of irony, he questioned bi-culturalism with a visual language that was direct, often aggressively pointed yet removed.

Living and working overseas in the late 1990's, early 2000's, Robinson's work held a sense of exile engendered by being separated from one's own culture and language. With Ack, his work shifted from this rhetoric and the weight of interpretation to viscerally celebrate materials and visuality.

Ack, curated by Brian Butler, was Peter Robinson's first solo exhibition of new work in a public gallery since bi-polar at the 49th Venice Biennale in 2001 and saw him playfully utilise the gallery space and test its limits. This work reanimated and reintroduced motifs, which spoke more to a sculptural and intuitive engagement with material rather than polemics.

Peter Robinson was awarded the Walters Prize in 2008 for Ack.