James Cousins

b.1965, Christchurch, New Zealand
Lives and works in Auckland, New Zealand

James Cousins is a contemporary painter. Active since the 1990s, he has created a substantial body of complex artworks that explore materiality, image structure, and the mechanics of representation. Cousins uses a broad range of tools in his work, including stencils, vinyl cutters, and armatures. A theme he has often explored is the friction between material and image – how images reconcile with the materiality of paint and canvas.

His works have ranged from representational botanical studies through to abstract informational fields. Cousins sees these works as related, botanical images and abstract works are both translations of visual information into paint. This considered enquiry into the nature of the painted image has been a consistent through line in his work over many years. His paintings can be visually quite distinct from one another while sharing a consistent conceptual framework.

Born and raised in Christchurch, Cousins completed a Bachelor of Fine Arts at Ilam, Canterbury School of Fine Arts (1989) before qualifying as a teacher (1998). He later earned a Master of Fine Arts degree from Elam School of Fine Arts in Auckland (2004), where he is currently a Senior Lecturer. Cousins’ first exhibition was in 1996 and he has exhibited regularly in New Zealand and Australia since. In 2000 he was the recipient of the Christchurch-based Olivia Spencer Bower Award Fellowship. The works he created during this residency are now part of the Christchurch City Art Gallery collection.

Cousins’ exhibition highlights include Necessary Distraction, Auckland Art Gallery Toi O Tamaki, Auckland (2016), the solo exhibition Restless Idiom, Te Uru Waitakere Contemporary Gallery, Auckland (2015), and inclusion in Code NZ at Canvas International in the Netherlands (2004), which resulted in his participation in the 2005 Rotterdam Art Fair.

Gow Langsford Gallery has represented James Cousins since 2008.