Community
Writing
Charting the Constellations of the Oceans, Rivers, and Islands
By Julie Nagam
09.07.2021
As the inaugural Artistic Director for Nuit Blanche Toronto (2020 and 2022), Dr Julie Nagam is interested in forging new relationships between Indigenous and non-Indigenous communities, in Turtle Island (North America) and internationally, and in the use of digital and new media to express shared experiences of colonialism. Here, Nagam introduces several recent projects undertaken in collaboration with artists and curators from Aotearoa and the new global partnership The Space Between Us, emerging from these cross-cultural exchanges.
Writing
Some Kind of Travelogue
By Esther Lu
18.06.2021
Aotearoa-based artist Sorawit Songsataya’s practice explores the many tangents that connect and redefine our understandings of subjectivity and ecology. Songsataya was invited to participate in the group show, The Turn of the Fifth Age, at Selasar Sunaryo Art Space in Bandung, Indonesia, earlier this year, where they exhibited their work Jupiter. Here, co-curator Esther Lu responds to that work.
Writing
Forever Fresh Talanoa Series
By AJ Fata, Anne-Marie Te Whiu, Drew Broderick, Josh Tengan
29.05.2021
The third episode of our four-part talanoa series, produced in collaboration with In*ter*is*land Collective, sees writer and poet Anne-Marie Te Whiu respond to a discussion between AJ Fata, Josh Tengan, and Drew Kahuʻāina Broderick who explore the concept of time and ancestral knowledge as a path for the historical future.
Writing
Forever Fresh Talanoa Series
By Anne-Marie Te Whiu, Isoa Tupua, Lyall Hakaraia
04.04.2021
Our second offering in this four-part talanoa series, produced in collaboration with In*ter*is*land Collective, sees Lyall Hakaraia and Isoa Tupua discuss queer communities/scenes in London, witnessing the bare minimum, gentrification, and how to clock an invite to a sex party. Written response by Brisbane-based poet, editor, weaver and festival director Anne-Marie Te Whiu.
Writing
Amidst and Beyond
By Alice Connew, Virginia Woods-Jack
10.03.2021
To celebrate the February 2021 release of Dwelling in the Margins: Art Publishing in Aotearoa, a new publication by GLORIA Books, HUM is pleased to republish this extract in which two photographers speak about their artistic and publishing practices, and about their work highlighting women in photography through collaborative projects and platforms that foster debate, visibility and community.
Project
Forever Fresh Talanoa Series
Partnership
A collaboration between In*ter*is*land Collective and Contemporary HUM consisting of four edited online talanoa (conversations) between several tagata Moana (Māori and Pasifika people) across the globe which centre around the principles of talanoa; ofa, mafana, malie and faka'apa'apa (love, warmth, humour and respect) and the ability to have a "reciprocal knowledge exchange".
The talanoa within this series will focus on topics such as life in the diaspora, moana futurism, queer identities and ReMoanafication, and all will be individually responded to in written form by Anne-Marie Te Whiu (Te Rarawa), reminding us of our intricate connection and shared ancestry in Te Moananui-a-Kiwa.
Writing
Forever Fresh Talanoa Series
By Afatasi The Artist, Anne-Marie Te Whiu, Momoe i manu ae ala atea’e Tasker
28.02.2021
In this first episode of our new special series of talanoa (online conversations) produced in collaboration with In*ter*is*land Collective, Anne-Marie Te Whiu responds to a discussion between Afatasi the Artist and Momoe i manu ae ala atea’e Tasker on identity and how it's expressed in their creative practices, finding their community in various daily rituals while living in the diaspora, and maintaining their connections to 'home'.
Writing
Movements of Outsiders
By Alexa Wilson
10.02.2021
Together with three of her contemporaries, interdisciplinary artist Alexa Wilson considers dance and performance art in the time of Covid - how does a medium that relies so much on physical presence, collaboration, audience and space respond to global lockdowns and a forced shift online?
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.
Writing
Forever Fresh
By Jessica Palalagi
06.11.2020
Jessica Palalagi, co-founder of the In*ter*is*land Collective, describes how their physical base in London, MOKU Pacific HQ, London, has served as a place for tagata Moana in the UK to create and meet since its inception in 2018, and reflects on the highs and lows of the past three years, including their exhibition in late 2019, Mana Moana, Mana Wahine.
Project
Taiwan-New Zealand Dialogue on Cultural Exchange Policies amid Covid-19
Panel discussion
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
Mata Aho Collective at the Dhaka Art Summit
By Pauline Autet
21.04.2020
We finish our first series focusing on the Asia region with Contemporary HUM Editor Pauline Autet interviewing Mata Aho Collective on their participation in the Dhaka Art Summit, Bangladesh in February 2020, where they partook in panel discussions and practised a type of waiata (song) called a pātere.
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
Screaming Strawbears and other Strange Engagements
By Tessa Laird
05.07.2019
From Morris dancing to costume making, Berlin-based artist Matthew Cowan and arts writer Tessa Laird discuss Cowan's interest in folklore, the function of tradition in the modern world and the influence of surrealism on his practice. Cowan's exhibition The Scream of the Strawbear opens at Kunsthalle Giessen in Germany on 7 September 2019.
Writing
Raw Matériel
By Emil McAvoy
10.06.2019
Within the greater context of the recent massacre in Christchurch, San Fransisco-based New Zealand photographer Jono Rotman discusses his new work Matériel which depicts a series of privately owned guns in the US, and his recent publication Mongrelism, which features the New Zealand-based gang, the Mighty Mongrel Mob.
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
Mana Moana in the UK’s year of Captain Cook
By Ahilapalapa Rands, Jo Walsh
21.09.2018
London-based cultural producer Jo Walsh and artist Ahilapalapa Rands discuss some of the exhibitions and programmes taking place in the UK to mark the 250th anniversary of Captain Cook's departure to the Pacific, which also resonates to many as the start of colonisation in Moana-Nui-A-Kiwa. In this conversation piece, Rands and Walsh focus in on the projects they have been involved in, working with The British Library, Whitby Library and other UK institutions, and their efforts to disrupt the major narratives surrounding Cook.
Writing
He Landed in a Place of Absolute Magic
By Hamish Coney, Kevin Ireland
03.04.2018
Although born in Yorkshire, the late artist Michael Illingworth immigrated to Aotearoa at age 20 in the early 1950s, before returning to England and Europe for a brief but formative period in 1959. Hamish Coney interviews the poet and writer Kevin Ireland OBE, one of Illingworth’s oldest New Zealand friends, on their London years (1959-61); a period of, as Ireland explains, 'high-octane education and inspiration'.
Writing
An interview with Lisa Reihana
By Contemporary HUM
22.09.2017
As part of Contemporary HUM’s series of interviews with New Zealand artists exhibiting during the 57th Venice Biennale, we talk to Lisa Reihana, New Zealand's representative at the Biennale about her experience in Venice.
Writing
Passing Torches
By Barbara Sirieix, Caterina Riva
08.12.2016
A conversation between writers and curators Barbara Sirieix and Caterina Riva, reflecting on their practices and time spent in Aotearoa at The Physics Room in Christchurch and Artspace New Zealand in Auckland, and their work exhibiting Aotearoa artists Tahi Moore, Alicia Frankovich and William Hsu.