Dean Tercel

There was never any doubt that I would become an artist, even given my boyhood dreams of being a stuntman Kung Fu master. From early childhood, despite an abundance of energy, I was most content sitting by myself intently wrestling with pencils and paper. Over the ensuing decades of continuing that nascent struggle there have been numerous and divergent competing artistic influences. Far too many to list here, but they all added voice to the same question - what sort of artistic approach do I take and how do I materially express it? That question is as relevant today as it was when it occupied my youthful mind standing in the Auckland Art Gallery transfixed by the artworks of an exhibition of Edvard Munch and his contemporaries. After that encounter with the mix of paintings, lithographs and wood block prints serious inquiry into my art practise truly began, leading to several years of intense wood block cutting and printmaking. Of equal importance as my art practice, my entire life, has been the comradery of books. Reading (exclusively non-fiction these days) at home, sometimes in verdant parks or cafes and bars, midst the clamour of humanity, but alone and content as that childhood version of myself.