Zavros presents a performance featuring a Rolls-Royce Wraith and Australia’s superstar models the Stenmark twins.

The performance entitled Forty is an extension of the solo exhibition presented at The Melbourne Art Fair.

The suite of paintings includes a still life featuring stems of gladioli flowers arranged in a vase and inverted to resemble an octopus. A Rolls-Royce takes a similar approach with standard poodles arranged to conjure up a classic Rolls-Royce. Witty in their allusions to art history, these new works are a melange of baroque and pop influences. They also provide an exhibition setting for Forty, an artist-directed performance using a Wraith displayed as a readymade artwork, set to take the stage as a performer along with Zac and Jordan Stenmark.

The performance marks a moment in time. Three days after the fair closes Zavros will turn 40, a milestone he has chosen to mark with flair. The models will offer chocolate gold coins embossed with the artist’s signature monogram and birth date, seemingly eternally sourced from the Rolls-Royce to an assembled audience. The chocolates will appear in abundance and be proffered, with quiet ceremony, as a gift.

Age is the enemy of youth and beauty; still life painting is the very evocation of time stilled. Embedded in the performance and in the mien of the beautiful men offering these sweet morsels is the acknowledgement of time’s inexorable movement. Unlike painting, which will endure and cheat the passage of time, the nature of performance is fleeting and temporary.
http://www.artcollector.net.au/VideoInterviewMichaelZavros