Regan Tamanui

Regan Tamanui
Born	Melbourne, Australia
Known for	Painting
Movement	Stuckism

Regan Tamanui is a self-taught artist based in Melbourne, Australia. In October 2000, he founded the Melbourne Stuckists, the fourth Stuckist group to be started and the first outside of the United Kingdom. The Stuckists are pro-painting and anti-conceptual art.

In October 2000, Regan Tamanui, a jazz, ska and skank fan, discovered the London Stuckist group whilst surfing the internet. He sent an email and then founded the Melbourne Stuckists. He saw "The main (point) that really stood out was the ability to wake up and paint pictures." This was the fourth Stuckist group to be started and the first one outside the UK, thus launching an international movement that by 2006 counted 127 groups in 32 countries. On 27 October 2000 he staged the first Stuckist show outside the UK, when he mounted the Real Turner Prize Show at the Dead End Gallery in his home in Reno Road, Sandringham, concurrent with three shows of the same title (two in England and one in Germany) in protest against the Tate Gallery's Turner Prize.

Besides Tamanui, the other initial members of the Melbourne group were Justin Grub, Ben Blanchette, Malcome Mmackie and Dave Freeman Rose. A subsequent line-up was Basil Kouvelis, Justin Grubb, Ben Frost, Nigel Stein, Daniel Gorzadek, Stephen Sperling and Dennis Roper. Tamanui expressed his and the group's artistic philosophy:

In May 2001, Tamanui, Stein, Grubb and Kouvelis were represented with 24 international groups in the London show Vote Stuckist, so named because Stuckist co-founder, Charles Thomson, was standing as a candidate in the United Kingdom general election, 2001 against the then-Culture Secretary, Chris Smith.

In November 2001, the Melbourne Stuckists staged a show Houdini to Hofmann at the Chiara Goya Gallery, which included some UK Stuckist work for the first time.

Kaye Blum made a short documentary on the group, Art Gets Unstuck. The film is structured around the artists reading lines from the Stuckists Manifesto written by Charles Thomson and Billy Childish. It was first shown at the Jaffas Down the Aisle film festival in Melbourne in October 2001, then in 2002 at the International Film Festival of Fine Art in Hungary and the Asolo Arts Film Festival in Italy, where it was nominated for best student short.

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