Browse and shop from Desmond Burdon’s most recent exhibition:
“A-Part”
April 2025
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“A man and a woman. Two men. Two women. The dynamics shift, but the distance feels the same.
In this series, I explore the fragile space between togetherness and separation - using two chairs as a constant, a silent metaphor for the couple: once aligned, now shifting, distanced, or estranged.
Sometimes the relationship appears intact, even comfortable - but just below the surface, the cracks begin to spread.
This is a departure from my usual narrative and visual style. The work is more painterly, more graphic — deliberately so. I needed a break from the familiar. I needed to experiment. Because life, too, had taken an unexpected turn.
After 35 years, my own relationship began to break down. That fracture, though now mercifully beginning to mend, shook the foundations of my world. This body of work emerged from that rupture - part catharsis, part exploration, part”
An open book lies flat—on one page, a father lifts his daughter across the spine, away from the mother on the opposite side. Two matching chairs mirror the divide. Bright, clashing colours and long shadows hint at the unspoken weight of separation. A moment many know, rendered with clarity and compassion.
Mixed Media
Prints in the highest quality;
Hahnemuhle 310gsm, Archive inks
Limited Print runs:
A0: 84.1 x 118.9 cm - 1 Print - $2250 NZD ea.
A1: 59.4 x 84.1 cm - 2 Prints - $1100 NZD ea.
A2: 42.0 x 59.4 cm - 3 Prints - $495 NZD ea.
Framing Available at request,
please enquire.
Two men sit together, but the relationship is already splintering. One figure is doubled, pulled in two directions—unresolved, uncertain. The other sits quietly as his chair begins to collapse beneath him. Confusion and decay, side by side. The scene is rendered with stark simplicity—blocks of colour and minimal detail—allowing the emotion to speak louder than form.
Mixed Media
Prints in the highest quality;
Hahnemuhle 310gsm, Archive inks
Limited Print runs:
A0: 84.1 x 118.9 cm - 1 Print - $2250 NZD ea.
A1: 59.4 x 84.1 cm - 2 Prints - $1100 NZD ea.
A2: 42.0 x 59.4 cm - 3 Prints - $495 NZD ea.
Framing Available at request,
please enquire.
Two women, two stylised chrome chairs, one handbag, and long shadows that stretch across a plain wall. Nothing is said, yet everything is felt. The image is stripped back to essentials—still, sharp, and emotionally distant. The silence between them is where the story lives.
Mixed Media
Prints in the highest quality;
Hahnemuhle 310gsm, Archive inks
Limited Print runs:
A0: 84.1 x 118.9 cm - 1 Print - $1450 NZD ea.
A1: 59.4 x 84.1 cm - 2 Prints - $750 NZD ea.
A2: 42.0 x 59.4 cm - 3 Prints - $450 NZD ea.
Framing Available at request,
please enquire.
A man stands isolated in the far corner by a window—washed in blue, unreachable. The woman sits low and lost on a brown chair. Between them and the viewer, another brown chair blurs into focus, its vertical lines suggesting the bars of a prison. The whole scene is quiet, cold, and heavy with separation.
Mixed Media
Prints in the highest quality;
Hahnemuhle 310gsm, Archive inks
Limited Print runs:
A0: 84.1 x 118.9 cm - 1 Print - $2250 NZD ea.
A1: 59.4 x 84.1 cm - 2 Prints - $1100 NZD ea.
A2: 42.0 x 59.4 cm - 3 Prints - $495 NZD ea.
Framing Available at request,
please enquire.
A framed artwork hangs in a gallery: ten thick wooden planks form the surface, their joinery echoing the uneasy seams of a relationship. Painted in stark white silhouettes, a couple sit as opposing chairs in front of vibrant, tropical chaos. A dog waits beneath the woman’s seat—loyal and still. The gallery’s white walls heighten the contrast. It’s a contained battlefield, rendered with precision and distance, asking the viewer to step in and feel the moment unravel.
Mixed Media
Prints in the highest quality;
Hahnemuhle 310gsm, Archive inks
Limited Print runs:
A0: 84.1 x 118.9 cm - 1 Print - $2250 NZD ea.
A1: 59.4 x 84.1 cm - 2 Prints - $1100 NZD ea.
A2: 42.0 x 59.4 cm - 3 Prints - $495 NZD ea.
Framing Available at request,
please enquire.
Back-to-back, a couple sit in block-like forms—emotionally entangled, yet apart. Their child stands at the door, in pyjamas, holding a teddy bear, silently watching. Sleep will end the day for her—but not the tension. The staged, framed room heightens the sense of confinement: a small, boxed-in world where love has turned into quiet conflict.
Mixed Media
Prints in the highest quality;
Hahnemuhle 310gsm, Archive inks
Limited Print runs:
A0: 84.1 x 118.9 cm - 1 Print - $2250 NZD ea.
A1: 59.4 x 84.1 cm - 2 Prints - $1100 NZD ea.
A2: 42.0 x 59.4 cm - 3 Prints - $495 NZD ea.
Framing Available at request,
please enquire.
Amid the bright colours and laughter of a fun fair, a couple comes to a slow stop on the swing-chairs. She looks at him with quiet fury. Around them, the world celebrates—but even joy can't hide the heaviness of heartbreak. This ironic setting reveals a truth: separation travels with us, even to places meant for escape
Mixed Media
Prints in the highest quality;
Hahnemuhle 310gsm, Archive inks
Limited Print runs:
A0: 84.1 x 118.9 cm - 1 Print - $2250 NZD ea.
A1: 59.4 x 84.1 cm - 2 Prints - $1100 NZD ea.
A2: 42.0 x 59.4 cm - 3 Prints - $495 NZD ea.
Framing Available at request,
please enquire.
Thus image explores the strain of office relationships, where personal and professional lives collide. The pressures of workplace politics, constant proximity, and blurred boundaries often intensify tensions rather than ease them. What might begin as companionship can quickly become confinement. There is no escape, and home and office merge into one.
Mixed Media
Prints in the highest quality;
Hahnemuhle 310gsm, Archive inks
Limited Print runs:
A0: 84.1 x 118.9 cm - 1 Print - $2250 NZD ea.
A1: 59.4 x 84.1 cm - 2 Prints - $1100 NZD ea.
A2: 42.0 x 59.4 cm - 3 Prints - $495 NZD ea.
Framing Available at request,
please enquire.
Two women sit in silence - together, but no longer connected. One has two heads, her confusion made visible.
There is no villain here, only distance that is growing, and a quiet breakdown of something once whole.
Mixed Media
Prints in the highest quality;
Hahnemuhle 310gsm, Archive inks
Limited Print runs:
A0: 84.1 x 118.9 cm - 1 Print - $2250 NZD ea.
A1: 59.4 x 84.1 cm - 2 Prints - $1100 NZD ea.
A2: 42.0 x 59.4 cm - 3 Prints - $495 NZD ea.
Framing Available at request,
please enquire.
In a crowded, abstracted room, one partner hides behind a towering chair wrapped in unread newspapers. The other stands alone, beside a normal seat—present, but disconnected. The scene resists a single meaning, like the end of any relationship: noisy, confusing, and open to interpretation. The simplified, sculptural forms heighten the sense of emotional scale.
Mixed Media
Prints in the highest quality;
Hahnemuhle 310gsm, Archive inks
Limited Print runs:
A0: 84.1 x 118.9 cm - 1 Print - $2250 NZD ea.
A1: 59.4 x 84.1 cm - 2 Prints - $1100 NZD ea.
A2: 42.0 x 59.4 cm - 3 Prints - $495 NZD ea.
Framing Available at request,
please enquire.