Kenny Pittock
Kenny Pittock
(b. 1988, Naarm/Melbourne. Lives and works in Naarm/Melbourne)
Based in his Coburg studio, Kenny Pittock works with ceramics, painting and drawing to elevate and celebrate everyday life. He often uses humour as an entry point to discuss serious topics such as anxiety, both in an individual and a collective, global sense.
52 ceramic replicas of shopping lists found while working in a Melbourne supermarket, 2022, is a series born out of Pittock’s many years spent working as a part-time cleaner and trolley pusher in a supermarket. During his time in the role, he collected over 5000 shopping lists left behind by shoppers. Recreating them here in kiln-fired earthenware clay, these otherwise fleeting, temporary objects are given another life.
‘Most shopping lists are written quickly, unlike ceramic-making, which is very slow. It is through this act of slowly recreating the objects that I allow myself the time and space to reflect on them,’ says the artist. ‘The anonymous shopping lists read like poetry. They show us that we’re all different but they also show how similar we are too. Each list is a little portrait, giving a tiny glimpse of insight into the people we pass as we walk down the aisles.’
Pittock completed a Bachelor of Fine Arts (Honours) at the Victorian College of the Arts, University of Melbourne, in 2013. He has held solo exhibitions in Italy, Singapore and New Zealand, as well as presented his work extensively in Australia, including at ACCA in Melbourne, PICA in Perth, Artspace in Sydney and Mona in Hobart. Pittock has been awarded the Linden Postcard Prize (2013) and the Redlands Emerging Artist Award (2017), and is included in many public collections, including Artbank, the Melbourne Art and Heritage Collection, Deakin University and the Monash University Museum of Art. Pittock is represented by MARS Gallery, Melbourne.