Humbug Like the Lolly

New Zealand abstract painter Peter Adsett and architect Sam Kebbell’s collaboration on Adsett’s Mornington Peninsula, Melbourne property, ‘Humbug’ features in the summer 21/11 issue of Architectural Review Australia. The building had to serve two very pragmatic purposes — it was to be both the Adsett family residence and an artist’s studio for Peter. The pair saw the commission as the perfect opportunity to put into practise the substance of much of what they had been discussing over the previous years since they first met in Wellington at Kebbel’s practise. “When we started the project, one of the key goals was to try and collapse art and architecture onto each other again,” Kebbell describes. Christened ‘Humbug’, the name is an allusion to both its stripy exterior shell (like the lolly) and a reference to the Indigenous Australian term for mischief, or trickery.