Harry Merriman

Harry Merriman is one of the inaugural Firstdraft Micro Commission artists.

A Whole Hole reflects the artist’s late‑life autism diagnosis and his difficulty in forming friendships. 

The swirling imagery, coupled with pixelated photographs below, considers the artist’s difficulty in understanding how men express emotion and affection as friends, as well as the societal limits placed on their vulnerability in public and private life. 

The work uses clips sourced from film where physical expressions of emotions between men come easily and are celebrated.  

Presented without sound, the piece removes the cues that usually guide social understanding. In silence, faces become impossible to read, gestures feel ambiguous, and the desire for connection becomes more visible. Instead, touch becomes the primary language of closeness; a way of reaching out when other forms of communication feel uncertain. 

Harry Merriman is an emerging artist currently living and working on Gadigal land in Sydney. He works with digital media, photography and painting to deconstruct how language and media influence’s contemporary Australian identity. Merriman received his MFA from The National Art School in Sydney in 2024, his BFA (Honours) from UNSW in 2020, and his BFA from UTS in 2019. His work has received the several awards including the ‘Harvey Galleries National Art School Graduate Award Exhibition’ and a highly commended in The Ballarat Foto Biennale’s ‘Grad Foto’. Merriman has also exhibited in several group shows, including at the Ballarat Foto Biennale (Ballarat), Photo Access (Canberra), Harvey Galleries (Sydney) and Stills Gallery (Edinburgh). Merriman's work is held in public and private collections, including the Macquarie Bank Collection.

@tru_ish_blue
https://www.harrymerriman.net/