Description
Author’s biography
Born in London in 1946, Peter Wichman moved to New Zealand with his family in 1960. He has an MA in English at Victoria University and an MLitt in Oxford, and studied drawing and painting at the Waikato Society of Arts. A literary historian as well as a painter, Wichman has had over twenty solo exhibitions, and has been a three-time finalist in the Wallace Art Awards.
Wichman brings his interest in literature and art history to bear on his paintings which generally deal with psychological and moral questions. Human passion, social responsibility, power struggle, conflicts of loyalty and the intrusion of the unexpected are themes which span his career. His pictures are highly narrative and often use references or symbols that suggest the recurring nature of experience. He attempts to portray the human predicament as something both eternal and immediate and, in doing so, he introduces figures from earlier cultures into his cast of contemporary characters.
