Christchurch Confidential – Martin Whitworth

In Christchurch Central Confidential Martin Whitworth, past recipient of the Centre of Contemporary Art Award, presents deceptively simple configurations of figure and form on paper and canvas to elicit the sense of menace and after-dark watchfulness implicit in the exhibition’s title. Using repeated actions (a hand on a back, a glance over a shoulder), a cutback bank of props – a cigarette, a cellphone – and the rough convention of glued together frayed canvases he conveys a sense of tension, an undercurrent of pain and illegality as glamour gives way to something more tawdry, sinister even.