Self portrait (non objective composition) purple (from 'AUS Australien' 1988 portfolio) 1988

John Nixon framed much of his practice in terms of the self-portrait. He engaged with the genre not through representation, but by focusing his attention on method and materials; each of his artworks functions as an expression of his conceptual approach to art. Nixon’s steadfastly non-representational style was informed by Russian Suprematism and the monochromatic paintings of Kasimir Malevich, who famously declared: ‘I transformed myself in the zero of form and emerged from nothing to non-objective creation’.

These three woodblocks are part of a larger series of five that were included in the print portfolio Aus Australien (From Australia) produced in 1988 by German curator and gallerist René Block.