| ABSTRACT : Christopher Zanko is an artist based in the Illawarra/Dharawal region of the New South Wales south coast. Pulling from the architecture, culture, and history of his hometown, Zanko transforms his suburban environments through his unique ways of seeing, bringing to life his lived experience in the everyday.
Heavily influenced by the process and aesthetics of Japanese woodblock carving, Zanko seeks to distinguish the individualism of the red brick and prefab suburbia. The elements that make a house a home – tyre swans, water features, specialty terrazzo porches, are carefully noticed in his subject matter. Through hours of meditative carving, deeply considering forms and colour palettes, Zanko creates a sense of permanence to his quiet subject matter, fixing them to this sense of place unique to him. By directing his gaze at the communities down the coast to Wollongong, the outer suburbs and regional cities of Australia, Zanko acknowledges quiet histories and of memories formed through action and objects, now preserved in his artworks.
Finalist of the Brett Whiteley Travelling Art Scholarship prize, Sulman and Wynne Prize, and Kings School Art Prize, Zanko’s work can also be found several significant collections including: The White Rabbit Collection, Macquarie Group, Museums of History New South Wales, Wollongong Art Gallery and University of Wollongong collections.
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