salonshop - Tumblr blog

[salonshop]

Hongerwinter is a new book co-published by Mokopōpaki and Envy to accompany the exhibition by Yllwbro, A.A.M. Bos, Dr P and Te Maari at Envy, Wellington.

Hongerwinter (2024) ka puta mai i WARY—A Survey (2018) ki Mokopōpaki, Ākarana.

Title: Hongerwinter Creator: Yllwbro, A.A.M. Bos, Dr P, Te Maari, authors; Mokopōpaki, author Contributor: Mokopōpaki, issuing body; Envy, issuing body Series: Mokopōpaki (Series), 10 May–8 June 2024 Publisher: Auckland, New Zealand: Mokopōpaki and Envy ISSN: 2537-8783 Publication Date: May 2024 Format: 24 pages; 21 cm Edition: 200 Notes: Screenprinted bag made by Greg Thomas

Purchase here

[salonshop]

Yllwbro, A.A.M. Bos, Dr P, Te Maari Hongerwinter 10 May – 8 June 2024 Ko tēnei te wā, ka kōrero Mokopōpaki o te kotahitanga i waenganui o Mokopōpaki me Envy, he whare whakaatu toi o Pōneke In collaboration with Envy Level 2, 22 Garrett Street, Te Aro, Wellington Opening Friday 10 May 5:30 – 7:30pm No one really makes a point of noticing the sparrow, but my mother did. She lived in a war zone and endured famine. In September 1944, after the intense Allied bombing of the Netherlands that preceded the failed British-led attack on Nijmegen, my mother, aged 14 years, and two boys from her street, were out in the countryside foraging and searching for food. Like many, the children were desperate and starving, roaming a landscape totally ravaged and destroyed by conflict. My mother said, while wandering this landscape, what she remembered about this terrible time, was that everywhere they went, everything had gone. Nothing was left. No trees, no birds, no rats, no cats, nothing, not even sparrows. All gone. Annihilated. Blown to bits or eaten. For my mother, a sparrow sitting on a fence was a sign of peace and plenty. May this symbol speak also to you. —A.A.M. Bos Hongerwinter is accompanied by a new book, co-published by Mokopōpaki and Envy More information Image: Dr P, Very Thin Vogel’s, 2024

[salonshop]

Ocula

Wellington gallery Envy's booth was likewise transporting, thanks largely to Dr P's Breakfast With Broodthaers (2023).

The mixed media installation of fishbones and shellfish on steel and aluminium kitchenware—including a pot of mussel shells trapped mid-explosion and a tray of chemically-fixed bread rolls—painted a portrait of a harbour dweller surviving on kaimoana and copies of the New Zealand Herald.

Sam Gaskin, Aotearoa Art Fair Receipts: Tarot Cards and Mussel Shells (Auckland: Ocula, 19 April, 2024)

[salonshop]

Dr P Breakfast With Broodthaers 18 – 21 April 2024 Presented in collaboration with Envy, Wellington Aotearoa Art Fair Envy, Booth U34 Viaduct Events Centre, 171 Halsey Street, Auckland VIP Preview Thursday 18 April, 1pm – 5pm Opening Night Thursday 18 April, 5pm – 9pm General Entry Friday 19 April, 11am – 6pm Saturday 20 April, 11am – 6pm Sunday 21 April, 11am – 5pm More information Dr P was born in Whanganui. She lives and works in Auckland. Her primal zodiac sign is the Vulture. Fellow Vultures include Gwyneth Paltrow, Snoop Dogg, Eminem and Truman Capote. Dr P is not a doctor or a dentist, lawyer or plumber. She is an occasional writer, indoor landscape garden designer and General Secretary of the Mokopōpaki Exhibitions Committee (MMPK).  Selected exhibitions include: Colonial Road, Pah Homestead, Auckland; Colonial Road, Mokopōpaki, Auckland; Domestic #3: Ahimaru, Mokopōpaki, Auckland; and This Joyous, Chaotic Place: He Waiata Tangi-ā-Tahu, Mokopōpaki, Auckland. Selected books include: Colonial Road, Auckland: Mokopōpaki & The Arts House Trust; Domestic #3: Ahimaru, Auckland: Mokopōpaki; The Last Picture Show, Auckland: Mokopōpaki; Colonial Road, Auckland: Mokopōpaki; This Joyous, Chaotic Place: He Waiata Tangi-ā-Tahu, Auckland: Mokopōpaki & Spiral; Taranaki Tiki Tour, Auckland: Kīnaki Press; Have you heard of Artemisia?, with Allie Eagle & Heather McPherson, Wellington: Spiral Collectives; Not Another Gondola: Venezia via Rialto: A Self-Guided Walk in Photographs, Part 2, Auckland: Kīnaki Press; Not Another Gondola: Venezia via Rialto: A Self-Guided Walk in Photographs, Part 1, Auckland: Kīnaki Press; and Was There: Jane Zusters at Tivoli, Auckland: Kīnaki Press. Image: Dr P, Breakfast With Broodthaers, 2023 Mixed media installation, dimensions variable Courtesy the artist, Envy and Mokopōpaki Photo: Arekahānara

[salonshop]

Art News Aotearoa (NZ)

Red Teddy is co-published by Mokopōpaki and Te Tuhi, following the exhibition of the same name by Roman Mitch at Te Tuhi in 2022. The exhibition itself followed from Girls! Hit Your Hallelujah, presented at Mokopōpaki in 2018. Appropriating an online New York Times art review, the opening page is a press release about Mitch and his daughter, Ngaroma. Using the narrow format of the Times newspaper and the visual language of Richard Prince, the pages that follow colourfully reproduce a conversation between Te Ahorangi Grace Rangitauninihi Tūī and Mokopōpaki about her arrival in Tāmaki Makaurau from Rotorua in 1969, her unique sense of style and the Māori concept of rangatiratanga. Rich in art historical, conceptual and visual interconnections, Red Teddy shares a glimpse of almost 30 artworks, photographed by Sam Hartnett, including contributions from Rangi herself (The Discipline of Choosing, 2022), Mitch’s mother (Penelope Sue), his children (Marcel & Ngaroma), Ursula Christel and Yllwbro. Further referencing Mitch’s use of customised computer cases as stencils, the screen-printed cover, made by Struan Hamilton and Greg Thomas, alludes to carbon fibre, camo or snakeskin.

Book Stand: Red Teddy (Auckland: Art News Aotearoa, No. 201, Autumn 2024), p. 48

[salonshop]

Maureen Lander, Wave Skirt, 2023

Harakeke, muka, dye, acrylic

c. 150 x 200 cm

Photo: Sam Hartnett

[salonshop]

Maureen Lander, Wave Skirt, 2023

Harakeke, muka, dye, acrylic

c. 150 x 200 cm

Photo: Sam Hartnett

[salonshop]

Maureen Lander, Wave Skirt, 2023

Detail

Photo: Sam Hartnett

[salonshop]

Maureen Lander, Wave Skirt, 2023

Detail

Photo: Sam Hartnett

[salonshop]

Maureen Lander, Wave Skirt, 2023

Detail

Photo: Sam Hartnett

[salonshop]

Andrew Barber, Neighbours, 2022

Pigment, sand, gesso on linen

38/35 x 51 cm

Signed Andrew Barber and dated 2022 (on the reverse)

Courtesy Envy, Wellington

[salonshop]

Andrew Barber, Kahukura, 2022

Pigment, sand, gesso on linen

38/35 x 51 cm

Signed Andrew Barber and dated 2022 (on the reverse)

Courtesy Envy, Wellington

[salonshop]

Red Teddy is a new book co-published by Mokopōpaki and Te Tuhi to accompany the exhibition by Roman Mitch at Te Tuhi in 2022. Red Teddy (2022) ka puta mai i Girls! Hit Your Hallelujah (2018) ki Mokopōpaki, Ākarana. Title: Red Teddy Creator: Roman Mitch, author; Mokopōpaki, author Contributor: Mokopōpaki, issuing body; Te Tuhi, issuing body; Sam Hartnett, photographer Series: Mokopōpaki (Series), 25 September–13 November 2022 Publisher: Auckland, New Zealand: Mokopōpaki and Te Tuhi ISSN: 2537-8783 Publication Date: December 2023 Format: 24 pages: colour illustrations; 30 cm Edition: 200 Notes: Spray painted insert by Roman Mitch; screenprinted cover made by Struan Hamilton and Greg Thomas More information and purchase here

[salonshop]

Yllwbro Folded Memory 18 November 2023 – 28 March 2024 Te Pātaka Toi Adam Art Gallery Gate 3, Kelburn Parade, Wellington Tuesday to Sunday, 11am – 5pm Curators’ tour Saturday 18 November 2pm Folded Memory asks what we might learn from the physical evidence of time within the folded rings of a tree and invites audiences to imagine the gallery as a forest in which new histories can be made. Drawing on Ngā Puhipuhi o Te Herenga Waka—Victoria University of Wellington Art Collection alongside key loaned items to both complement and complicate the collection, Folded Memory is part of an ongoing collaboration between Susan Ballard and Sophie Thorn. It is envisioned as part of a larger series which aims to shift from listening, to remembering, to imagining and in doing so narrate a new environmental art history of Aotearoa. More information

Yllwbro is an anonymous sibling collaboration established in 2015. Big sister and little brother. Wētā and Kōkako. Inventive and often unpredictable, they help themselves to images and objects and tell stories using their own unique sense of Māori worldview. Though the artists are not outwardly present, Yllwbro is mindful of the need to communicate and write critically about their work.

Image: Yllwbro, Te Tohu o Kōanga, 2017 Ngā Puhipuhi o Te Herenga Waka—Victoria University of Wellington, VUW.2018.4

[salonshop]

EyeContact (NZ)

Three Mokopōpaki artists (A.A.M. Bos, Carole Prentice, Dr P) feature in three spatially separated, Pah Homestead galleries. All quite different, but with a connecting thread that is carefully explained in the very thorough exhibition catalogue.

That thread is the meandering Colonial Road in Birkenhead that winds its way down to the stagnant reservoir next to the Chelsea Sugar Refinery. In particular, the shag colony (with three types of shag) living in the oak trees at the edge of the deoxygenated lake.

In the colonial homestead’s upstairs AV Gallery, A.A.M. Bos presents a fascinating twenty minute film examining the feeding habits, courtship rituals, nest building, and chick raising routines of the shags, as well as visually elucidating the spatial relationship of the colony to Colonial Rd, the Auckland Harbour Bridge and the Chelsea factory buildings — while featuring Elgar’s Pomp and Circumstance march and part of Serenade for Strings in E Minor Opus 20 as a movie soundtrack.

The sequences with ornithological content are related to the photographic work of fellow New Zealander Richard Frater, with his keen studies of bird life in Germany; but with a different kind of political focus, more layered and about the history of colonialism, being symbolic and less overtly ecological.

In Dr P’s installation in the Conservatory, an ornate mahogany chiffonier presents the remnants of a seafood breakfast for a family of Birkenhead shags, with a wall switch for a nearby poster of Magritte’s Empire of Light to aid a tall freestanding lamp for early morning illumination. ‘Illumination’ is the Doctor’s code word for wisdom, particularly when referencing natural resources.

Instead of the white sauce that Belgians like Magritte and Broodthaers are used to (particularly the latter with his billy of mussels), Dr P presents a plate of stale white buns alongside a bottle of HP British brown sauce to accompany the (now devoured) mussels, a colander of shelled cockles, and platters and silver trays of oyster shells and smoked fish skeletons. And hen’s eggs too, the shells of which are found with the planted shrubs. This mix is in keeping with the plants Dr P has positioned in the conservatory, that include not only an oak, but also a tōtara, a pōhutukawa and a kōwhai.

Carole Prentice’s father worked for the Chelsea Sugar Works, and so that institution was an important part of her childhood. Her display in the upstairs Little Gallery, close to the AV Gallery, presents a mixture of paintings and laminated translucent collages in a manner vaguely similar to Merylyn Tweedie. Empty trademarked paper bags once used for conveying Chelsea sugar are blended with drawn magazine images or family snaps of innocent young white girls on swings or steps, having a happy childhood, surrounded by shelves of sickly sugary confectionary.

The paintings are larger and more ominous. They exude a very different mood, being largely grey and black, sinister and apocalyptic. One has an image of what seems to be a disillusioned looming Christ climbing up out of the Birkenhead landscape. Actually it is James K. Baxter. Another has a smaller version of Baxter emerging from the swampy lake. Polluting ‘dark Satanic mills’ figure prominently in the backgrounds of both. Both contain empty white armchairs, past symbols of colonial exploitation and privilege.

One square colour-rich painting has a shag in a tree fighting a fierce taniwha, and a floating Māori God stick features in one of the lake paintings. These are possibly a reference to sovereignty disputes, or clashing religious / cultural ideologies. There is also a very subtle allusion on the bottom of one grey painting to the harvesting of Queensland canefields that Chelsea sugar came from, the hideous ‘blackbirding’ of South Pacific Islands, and the cruel indenture system.

This is an excellent grouping of thoughtful presentations that resonate together superbly. Well worth an excursion to Monte Cecilia Park.

John Hurrell, Mokopōpaki Trio on Birkenhead History and Ornithology (Auckland: EyeContact, 18 May, 2023)

[salonshop]

A.A.M. Bos, Carole Prentice, Dr P Colonial Road 20 April – 2 July 2023 Pah Homestead 72 Hillsborough Road, Auckland Tuesday to Friday, 9am – 3pm Saturday and Sunday, 8am – 5pm Ever wondered what’s at the end of Colonial Road? It’s not a carpark or failed monument to imperial ambition but more a surprising, self-determined community of seabirds living in sight of the city. A.A.M. Bos’ film Colonial Road (2020) is an intimate, uncensored, harbourside view of the lives and crimes of The Real Shags of Chelsea Heritage Estate. Colonial Road is a three-artist exhibition including new work by Northland-based painter Carole Prentice, exploring family history and personal connection with place. Featured on the ground floor in the elegant Conservatory is another indoor garden landscape by Dr P, where, this time, her non-standard domestic exterior imagines an avian Breakfast Room just prior to the arrival of the morning mail. ‘The most well observed, sensitive and compassionate picture imaginable’ – Ted Coubray, Romantic and Sea-Girt North Shore (1928) Please note: The exhibition by Dr P in the Conservatory is open for three weeks only, closing Sunday, 14 May 2023 Colonial Road is accompanied by an exhibition catalogue, co-published by Mokopōpaki and Pah Homestead Colonial Road (2023) ka puta mai i Colonial Road (2020) ki Mokopōpaki, Ākarana

A.A.M. Bos lives in Auckland. His work investigates marginal urban ecosystems and habitats. Although the artist loves and admires the birds he photographs, A.A.M. Bos does not tweet. Or do Facebook. Mokopōpaki exhibition history: Colonial Road, 2020; Domestic #3: Ahimaru, The Dutch Embassy, 2019; WARY—A Survey, 2018; Whio: Blue Duck, Other Perspectives, 2017. Carole Prentice is a baker’s daughter from Panmure. She received a Bachelor of Fine Arts in 2001 from Elam School of Fine Arts, University of Auckland. Her paternal great grandfather, Jean-Baptiste Grondin, from the French overseas territory of Réunion Island in the Indian Ocean, arrived in Auckland in 1884, the same year Chelsea Sugar Works began operating a refinery on the North Shore. Carole says her love of ‘something a little sweet’ is inherited from her exotic French ancestor and their shared cultural passion for patisserie and all matters choux. Mokopōpaki exhibition history: Colonial Road, 2020; Household Hints: Ahikaea, 2019; Nīkau Delicatessen, 2018; Korekore Whakapiri, Other Perspectives, 2017. Dr P aka Cushla P is not a doctor or a dentist. Disregarding her mother’s sound career advice, she is neither a lawyer nor a plumber. Dr P is an occasional writer, indoor landscape garden designer and General Secretary of the Mokopōpaki Exhibitions Committee (MMPK). Mokopōpaki exhibition history: Colonial Road, 2020; Domestic #3: Ahimaru, 2019; This Joyous, Chaotic Place: He Waiata Tangi–ā–Tahu, 2018. Image: A.A.M. Bos, Avian Shits, 2023

[salonshop]

Andrew Barber, Stiff Blanket (Diff), 2021

Ink on linen

165 x 165 cm

Signed Andrew Barber and dated 2021 (on the reverse)

Photo: Arekahānara