Archibald artist Katherin Longhurst has a new exhibition with a sense of humour

Her work is on display in this year’s Archibald at the Art Gallery of NSW, but artist Katherin Longhurst is busy working away at something else; her latest exhibition, Protagonist, on show at Nanda Hobbs gallery in Surry Hills. Kathrin Longhurst is a child of the Cold War. She grew up on the grey side of the Berlin Wall. Her childhood was in a society indoctrinated and controlled with totalitarian vigour through the rule of law and a virulent propaganda machine. The perceived glamour of the west filtered through to the artist as a girl via beaten up glossy magazines and word of mouth stories that one could only dream of. Longhurst’s childhood of counting missiles in school books and experiencing firsthand the results of a society where everything is watched, has left an indelible impression on her. Five decades after the Rosenquist’s  F1-11, Longhurst pointedly pushes at the outer edges of the ideological boundaries in our world. Protagonist is an exhibition that delivers its message in a playful way, yet, ideologically nuclear in its motherload of social commentary.  It is an exhibition that speaks to a world that struggles with identity—not only from the nationalist point of view—but with male/female ideology.  Yet, like all great artists, Longhurst can keep a sense of humour, albeit laced with the irony and lessons from history. Protagonist opens at Nanda\Hobbs on Thursday 14 June, 6-8pm. The exhibition runs to 30 June, 2018.