In Halfway to the Splits, Reece King presents a collection of paintings produced during his time as the current Frances Hodgkins fellow at the University of Otago Ōtākou Wakaihu Waka. The collection reflects King’s strong intuitive approach to his painting practice. A cohesive aesthetic sensibility carries through the collection, with large gestures that blend form and abstraction between rough-edged drop-sheets. However, the works resist distillation to any overly deterministic schema or framework. Instead, they each strike an individual balance between the temporality of large familiar gestures with the cultural and psychological fragments. The result is a sense of entanglement and change, as if the paintings do not capture a single thought but the process of thinking itself.  

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The Frances Hodgkins fellowship represents the latest award in the series King has received since he won the New Zealand Painting and Printmaking Award in 2020 and completed his Master's in painting at Unitec Te Whare Wānanga o Wairaka in 2021. That year, he was also the recipient of the Eden Arts Karekare House residency and further received the inaugural Church Road Art Initiative in 2023. His work was included in Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tāmaki’s Aotearoa Contemporary exhibition in 2024, and King’s paintings are held in public and private collections, including those of Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tāmaki and MTG Hawke’s Bay Tai Ahuriri. 

Alongside his own practice, Reece has championed collaborative initiatives, co-founding Sanc Gallery, a painter-run space that has staged 25 exhibitions but is on hiatus while Reece completes his Fellowship.