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Writing
Taiwan-New Zealand Dialogue
By Catherine George, Catherine Lee, Isis Mingli Lee, Ron Hanson, Wan-Jung Wei
22.12.2020
A panel discussion exploring new ways of making art and connecting with audiences amid Covid-19 in New Zealand and Taiwan. Held on October 24 2020 and organised by the Taiwan Cultural Policy Research Association, as part of the Tua-Tiu-Tiann International Festival of Arts (TTTIFA).
Writing
Social Imagination
By Lance Pearce
20.11.2020
Xin Cheng's Seeing Like a Forest, made during her study at HFBK - University Of Fine Arts Hamburg from 2017-2019, focuses on issues such as sustainability, communities, and resourcefulness. Artist and writer Lance Pearce discusses these themes and their relevance to a world in the midst of a pandemic.
Project
Taiwan-New Zealand Dialogue on Cultural Exchange Policies amid Covid-19
Panel discussion in Taipei
Contemporary HUM is a proud partner of the Taiwan-New Zealand Dialogue on Cultural Exchange Policies amid Covid-19 panel discussion, organised by the Taiwan Cultural Policy Research Association. Held in the context of the Tua-Tiu-Tiann International Festival of Arts (TTTIFA) in Taipei, this panel discussion seeks to unpack the impact of Covid-19 on arts practitioners and the need for cultural exchange and dialogue.
Writing
Playing with Gender at the Tropenmuseum
By Millie Riddell
08.10.2020
What a Genderful World, the current exhibition at Amsterdam's Tropenmuseum, focuses on gender in the modern world and features Aotearoa artist Yuki Kihara; the next representative for New Zealand at the Venice Biennale. Writer Millie Riddell explores how the works presented function within the anthropological lens used in this exhibition and the balance between the genuine discussions of gender and the corporate and colonial undertones of the presentation.
Writing
Everything Stops for the Baby
By Chloe Lane, Peter Gouge
23.09.2020
In this correspondence, writer Chloe Lane and artist Peter Gouge discuss the origins of Gouge’s MFA final exhibition at the University of Florida, the functionality of objects, the intersection of parenthood and practice, and the upcoming exhibition at Melanie Roger Gallery in Auckland where the documentation of Gouge's project will be displayed.
Writing
Treatise as Exhibition
By Amira Gad
10.08.2020
In Part Two of this two-part conversation, curator Amira Gad and artist Simon Denny discuss Mine, an exhibition at MONA in Australia for which Denny created a 3D model of a proposed worker’s cage for Amazon; Proof of Work, Denny's 2018 curatorial project at Schinkel Pavillon in Berlin; as well as his participation in Vaudeville, a theatrical journalism experience organised by the Financial Times.
Writing
Treatise as Exhibition
By Amira Gad
20.07.2020
In the first piece of this two-part conversation, Aotearoa artist Simon Denny speaks about his recent projects, including his 2020 solo show at Altman Siegel in San Francisco which included former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher's scarves and 'Tech-Bro' Patagonia vests, and about corresponding with Peter Thiel after he came to see Denny's show at Michael Lett Gallery in Auckland in 2017.
Writing
Odysseus escapes the cyclops
By Zoe Crook
10.06.2020
A review of Invisible: a collaborative exhibition between the Detroit Cranbrook Academy of Art, Wellington’s Massey University and the Wrocław Academy of Art and Design. Held at BWA Gallery in Wrocław, Poland, in February 2020, the second iteration of Invisible includes New Zealand artists Kerry Ann-Lee, Simon Eastwood and Lisa Munnelly, Lee Jensen, Angela Kilford, and Jason O’Hara.
Writing
Resistance through Koloa
By Ysabelle Cheung
06.04.2020
The second publication from our special series focusing on the Asia region, looks to Hong Kong gallery Para Site, and its exhibition Koloa: Women, Art, and Technology. The exhibition centres on koloa, or customary women’s arts in Tonga, and features three artists from New Zealand: Tanya Edwards, Nikau Hindin, and Vaimaila Urale.
Writing
Permanent Migration
By Signe Rose
06.02.2020
In a letter to her husband sculptor Martyn Reynolds, artist Signe Rose reflects on their life in Vienna as parents and artists, having moved to Austria from New Zealand in 2010. She also shares about feeling like a constant tourist, and about the ways in which her art is viewed by both European and New Zealand audiences.
Writing
Moana, Unimagined
By Millie Riddell
08.01.2020
The 16th Istanbul Biennial, titled The Seventh Continent, had a thematic focus on the large garbage patch currently occupying 3.4 million square kilometres of ocean, near Hawaii and Japan. Despite focusing on this area, Pacific artists were not present at the Biennial. Writer Millie Riddell explores the omission of Pacific artists, and what it means to not address or include the people most affected by environmental pollution and climate change.
Writing
What's for - Decolonial - Dinner?
By Tania Willard
18.12.2019
Co-curated by Lana Lopesi, the exhibition Transits and Returns at Vancouver Art Gallery in Canada presents the work of 21 Indigenous artists from Northern America and the Pacific, and includes Aotearoa artists BC Collective, Louisa Afoa, Ahilapalapa Rands, and Edith Amituanai. In this essay, Indigenous Canadian artist and curator Tania Willard contextualises the work within a wider art history and personal history.
Writing
A Question of Identity
By Grace Lai
08.11.2019
New Zealand jeweller Johanna Zellmer's practice focuses on national identity and the varying bureaucracy that can divide us. In this essay, Curator Grace Lai looks specifically at Zellmer's recent three-month residency in Gothenburg, Sweden, and her exhibition of crafted and altered coins which acted as a vehicle to comment on the current political climate.
Writing
The Factory and its Memories
By Kari Schmidt
16.10.2019
A look at artist Matthew Galloway's residency at Cripta 747 in Turin, Italy, and the resulting exhibition The Factory and its Memories, which concentrates on the now defunct Nebiolo factory building, whose history is engrained in Italian graphic design and typography, reflecting Galloway’s own background as a graphic designer.
Writing
On Emptiness
By Rosa Gubay
02.10.2019
Oliver Perkins and Patrick Lundberg’s recent show On Emptiness at FOLD Gallery in London presented a conversation between the two artists' work, focusing on their object-centric painting practice. Writer Rosa Gubay analyses their use of negative space and the varying forms it can take.
Writing
Something Different
By Laura Preston
05.09.2019
A look at a series of exhibitions by women artists held at Secession in Vienna, including by New Zealand artist Fiona Connor, who has been based in Los Angeles since 2011. Connor's show, #8, Closed for Installation, Sequence of Events, presented cast bronze pieces alongside architectural interruptions, and was shown in conjunction with German artist Nora Schultz and Palestinian-English artist Rosalind Nashashibi.
Writing
Sriwhana Spong’s Ida-Ida
By Leah Reynolds
09.08.2019
London-based artist Sriwhana Spong has been exhibiting widely throughout the UK in 2019. In this essay, writer Leah Reynolds reviews Spong’s recent exhibition Ida-Ida at Spike Island in Bristol, considering the key, interrelating ideas of her work, and Spong’s use of a variety of mediums.
Writing
Behind the scenes of Post hoc in Venice
By Amber Baldock, Chris Sharp, Hope Wilson, Jude Chambers, Zara Stanhope
22.07.2019
What does it take to represent New Zealand at the Venice Biennale? How are five-metre tall, 500kg sculptures installed and secured? How do you vie for an audience’s attention on an island full of exhibitions and artworks? HUM interviews the team behind Post hoc, at the New Zealand Pavilion for the 2019 Venice Biennale.
Writing
An abundance of loss
By Zara Stanhope
12.05.2019
As part of HUM’s coverage of La Biennale di Venezia, we’ve invited Zara Stanhope, Lead Curator of the New Zealand Pavilion, to analyse Dane Mitchell’s work Post hoc and its lists of bygone things, as well as the artist's other major works exhibited at Mori Art Museum, Tokyo, Auckland Art Gallery and Raebervonstenglin, Zurich.
Writing
HUM live from the 2019 Venice Biennale
By Contemporary HUM
07.05.2019
HUM brings you live blog posts, videos, and exclusive images from the opening week of May You Live In Interesting Times, The 58th International Art Exhibition – La Biennale di Venezia, including Dane Mitchell's Post hoc for the New Zealand Pavilion.
Writing
Design solves problems and art creates problems
By Eleanor Woodhouse
23.04.2019
A closer look at Biljana Popovic's 12-month Visual Arts Residency at Künstlerhaus Bethanien in Berlin, and how her previous work as a commercial designer informs her current visual arts practice by integrating elements of interior design and architecture.
Writing
An interview with Dame Jenny Gibbs
By Pauline Autet
05.04.2019
As the commissioner of the New Zealand Pavilion in the years 2001, 2003 and 2019, Dame Jenny Gibbs has unparalleled knowledge on the history of New Zealand at the Venice Biennale. HUM's Editor Pauline Autet, speaks with Gibbs about the forthcoming biennale and about Dane Mitchell's project for the prestigious international exhibition.
Writing
Samoan Queer Lives (2018)
By Pauline de Souza
04.03.2019
Eleven years in the making, this is the first publication of its kind; a collection of 14 short stories from fa'afafine, or transgender and queer Samoans, focusing on their individual experiences in historic and modern times. Edited by artists Dan Taulapapa McMullin and Yuki Kihara, and published by Little Island Press in October 2018.
Writing
Spin Slowly, Fighting Gravity
By Samuel Walsh
04.02.2019
Arts facilitator and producer Samuel Walsh reflects on his residency at Zaratan - Arte Contemporânea in Lisbon, Portugal, where he was able to develop ideas for his own artist-run space, Strange Haven, in Tāmaki Makaurau. Although thousands of miles apart, Walsh and the facilitators of Zaratan discovered their shared joys and struggles of running an art space, and the importance of community in their practice.
Writing
Test Run
By Jennifer Thatcher
13.12.2018
We hear from three artists who, over the last three years, have completed, or are completing, a three-month residency at London art centre Gasworks. Sriwhana Spong in 2016, Katrina Beekhuis in 2017, and Hikalu Clarke, who is half-way through his, all share their experiences and thoughts on this important opportunity.
Writing
Oceania at the Met
By Maia Nuku
28.11.2018
Maia Nuku, Associate Curator for Oceanic Art at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, talks about the ways in which new curatorial practices are bringing life to the Oceanic collection at the Met. Nuku's collaborative research projects sees new connections between Pacific artists, scholars, cultural practitioners, curators and conservators, as well as Digital and Education teams from within the museum, allowing an activation of objects, and a "complication of institutional narratives."
Writing
Hotel Jaguar
By David Lillington
11.10.2018
HUM commissioned David Lillington to review Amanda Newall's recent project at Exposed Arts Projects in London, which occupies an old Jaguar car dealership. Newall's site-specific response, called Hotel Jaguar, encompasses an eclectic range of works and collaborations with other artists, on topics ranging from Jaguar and Brexit; Trump and witches; social dreaming and murders.
Project
Whose Oceania?
Panel discussion in London
Whose Oceania? is Contemporary HUM’s second public panel discussion, held on 29 September 2018 to coincide with the opening of the Oceania exhibition, on at the Royal Academy of Arts in London.
This exhibition is a major international event for Aotearoa New Zealand and the Pacific, and we have decided to take the opportunity to bring together several professionals from different backgrounds and practices in Māori and Pacific art, as well as colonial studies, to offer informed and critical responses to the show.
Writing
Dane Mitchell: An Aesthetic Contagion
By Marie de Brugerolle
06.09.2018
Dane Mitchell's exhibition OTIUM #3 at the Institut d'art contemporain - Villeurbanne in France, was an invitation to produce and exhibit works related to the dimensions of time and space, as part of an ongoing prospective series of exhibitions linked to 'métaphysiques cosmomorphes', a term taken from Pierre Montebello's philosophical research. French art historian and curator Marie de Brugerolle explores Mitchell's work within this context and his wider practice.
Writing
Kate Newby: I can’t nail the days down
By Chloe Geoghegan
14.08.2018
I can't nail the days down is Brooklyn-based Kate Newby's first Austrian solo exhibition, presented at Kunsthalle Wien in Vienna in 2018. Based both inside and outside of the Kunsthalle, the work invited visitors to take a closer look at Newby's engagements with the context of exhibition.