Ack and Other Abdications documents and considers the life of one sculpture, Ack – at once vast ice-flow and intestine that appeared first at Artspace in Auckland in 2006. Peter Robinson was the recipient of the Walters Prize 2008 for Ack.

The bulk of this 164-page book is devoted to full-colour documentation of the sculpture in its various iterations and a body of unexhibited paintings. The remainder features writing by Dan Arps, Matthew Crookes, Fiona Gillmore and John Ward-Knox, Gwynneth Porter and Laura Preston. The writing considers the sculpture at a temporal remove and considers its gross materiality and its abdications in the context of his wider practice.

Exhibition

Edited by Brian Butler
Texts by Dan Arps, Matthew Crookes, Fiona Gillmore and John Ward-Knox, Gwynneth Porter and Laura Preston
Published by Clouds and Artspace

January 2011

ISBN: 978-0-9582981-0-0

Softcover, 171 x 240 x 15mm
Colour & Black/white images

164 pages
Edition: 1000

English
NZ$49.95

enquire about this publication

recent publications

We are seeking a part time Communications Coordinator to join us in our work as a national leader in the visual arts community.  In joining Artspace the new Communications Coordinator will help to launch artists’ careers, host international artists and curators and generate critical dialogue about art through lectures, events and publications.

We are seeking a responsible individual who has excellent communications abilities and interpersonal skills to interface with the audience and the art and media community. The role will be 23 hours per week and will require enthusiasm, accuracy and great organization skills.

In particular, the successful candidate will work creatively and proactively in generating Artspace’s programme awareness across a range of interest groups.   Other key responsibilities include implementing a marketing plan and developing relationships with sponsors.

The successful candidate will have proven computer and website management skills as well as excellent writing ability and knowledge of design software and processes.  All applicants need to be knowledgeable and passionate about contemporary art and have a genuine interest in working at Artspace.

 Download the job description for this position (PDF) ►

Applications close on Monday 26 September

Interviews will be held on Tuesday October 4th           

To apply electronically, forward your CV with a cover letter to anna@artspace.org.nz

Alternatively, mail your CV and cover letter to: 

Artspace

PO Box 68418

Newton

Auckland 1145

 
Natasha Conland and Janita Craw will be in conversation about ideas related to Radiant Matter lll

Natasha Conland is the curator of Contemporary Art at Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tāmaki. She has worked with Dane Mitchell as the curator of Mystic Truths, a major group exhibition which explored the prevalence of mysticism in contemporary art, and its potential to shift the relationship of art to life. 

Janita Craw is a Senior lecturer in early childhood studies at A.U.T. Her interests include a range of different disciplinary perspectives, i.e. sociology, cultural studies, film and history. She considers visual art as 'a site of knowledge' which contributes to the understanding of practices in education.

ARTSPACE 
Level 1, 300 Karangahape Road
Newton | Auckland | New Zealand
+64 9 3034965|  www.artspace.org.nz
Tuesday - Friday 10-6 | Saturday 11-4
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ARTSPACE receives major public funding from  Creative New Zealand

This Saturday at 3pm Richards Francis will respond to 'The Smell of an Empty Space’ by Dane Mitchell. The performance will be a 60 min set where people will be able to move freely around the space.

The experience of sound and olfactory sense of smell both share a vibrational medium. Richard explains further:

In this way the title 'Familiars' references the recollection of emotionally charged memories that scent generates in my mind. On another level a 'familiar' is an attendant entity (often in animal form) believed to assist cunning folk in their practice of magic. For the past 3 years I've been researching acoustic qualities of ancient archeological ritual sites and ritual music. So for me this title ties together these two areas of interest: scent and it's power to influence the mind, sound and it's place in ritual and operation in ritual spaces.

He will use a range of sonic practices including recordings of empty interior spaces (rooms, hallways, stairwells). These recordings, rather than sounding empty, feature more the 'phantom sounds' from outside the recording space that drift in from adjoining rooms, through air vents and windows. And lastly he’ll be generating live textures from idiophones (dry seed pods, paper).

Richard Francis (b. 1977) is an Auckland based sound artist. He uses recordings of acoustic and electronic sounds, a tone generator, modular synthesizer and computer to compose and improvise sound works. He has released solo and collaborative albums on a number of labels including Korm Plastics (NL), Monochrome Vision (RU), Scarcelight (USA), Last Visible Dog (USA) and his own record label CMR (NZ).

For more info: www.richardfrancis.net.nz

ARTSPACE 
Level 1, 300 Karangahape Road
Newton | Auckland | New Zealand
+64 9 3034965|  www.artspace.org.nz
Tuesday - Friday 10-6 | Saturday 11-4
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ARTSPACE receives major public funding from  Creative New Zealand

courtesy Regen Projects, Los Angeles © Catherine Opie

Elam School of Fine Arts, International Artist in Residence, Catherine Opie will be giving a guest lecture
 

Born in 1961, Opie has become one of America’s premier photographers exhibiting extensively within the United States and internationally. Her photographs move from the territory of the body to the framework of the city, linked together by a conceptual framework of cultural portraiture. The works range from large scale colour works to smaller intimate black and white prints. Her position as one of the most important living photographers was cemented with her mid-career survey exhibition “Catherine Opie: American Photographer” at the Guggenheim Museum, New York in 2008. In 2009, Catherine she received the Women’s Caucus for Art: President’s Award for Lifetime Achievement and in 2006 she was the recipient of a United States Artists Fellowship. In 2004, she received the Larry Aldrich Award, in 1999 she was the recipient of the Washington University Freund Fellowship, and in 1997 she received the Citibank Private Bank Emerging Artist Award. 
 
Opie's work is in the permanent collections of the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles; the Los Angeles County Museum of Art; the Museum of Modern Art, New York; Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York; the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; Tate Modern, London; the Walker Art Center; and the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art.
 
During her time in New Zealand she will be exploring rural and urban landscapes. An exhibition of her work will be showing in projectspace B431, Elam School of Fine Arts, 20 Whitaker Place. Preview event 5.30pm, 9 August. Gallery Open 10-13 August 11am – 4pm.

EASY LISTENING TALK
ENGINEERING LECTURE THEATRE
RM 401, 20 SYMONDS ST

 

ARTSPACE 
Level 1, 300 Karangahape Road
Newton | Auckland | New Zealand
+64 9 3034965|  www.artspace.org.nz
Tuesday - Friday 10-6 | Saturday 11-4
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ARTSPACE receives major public funding from  Creative New Zealand

Please join us for a talk by Zune Lee. Zune Lee has been awarded the Artspace Residency Korea 2011 and will be in Auckland for two months hosted by Artspace and the School of Art and Design, AUT. Zune Lee is a designer and media artist who works across the visual arts, music, and computer engineering. He has created many interactive media art installations using physical computing techniques and computer languages that can simultaneously control digital image and sound in real-time.



During his time in Auckland Zune Lee will be working on projects including Weather Pong, a game based artwork, referencing the early arcade games Pong and Arkanoid. Weather Pong receives weather data from Soul (South Korea). He will install environmental sensor kits in both cities to gather real time local weather data. (The game also collects words concerning weather and environments from websites and social networks such as Google, Naver, and Twitter.) The Weather Pong project is part of a larger Weather Tunnel project which involves sourcing data from all around the world.

Artspace Residency Korea 2011 is funded by the Asia:NZ Foundation with support from Creative New Zealand and aims to create exchange by sending a New Zealand artist (Jeena Shin, 2011) to Korea to take up residency at the National Art Studio Changdong and a Korean artist (Zune Lee 2011) to take up a residency and realising a project here in Auckland with Artspace and the School of Art and Design, AUT.

Map for the lecture theatre►
 

ARTSPACE 
Level 1, 300 Karangahape Road
Newton | Auckland | New Zealand
+64 9 3034965|  www.artspace.org.nz
Tuesday - Friday 10-6 | Saturday 11-4
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ARTSPACE receives major public funding from  Creative New Zealand

Please join us this Saturday for a talk by Tahi Moore.

CARAWAY DOWNS
7 MAY - 18 JUNE
 ►

 
ARTSPACE 
Level 1, 300 Karangahape Road
Newton | Auckland | New Zealand
+64 9 3034965|  www.artspace.org.nz
Tuesday - Friday 10-6 | Saturday 11-4
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ARTSPACE receives major public funding from  Creative New Zealand

FIRST THURSDAYS
READING ROOM SPORTS ll
THURSDAY 2 JUNE, 6PM-8PM

 

First Thursdays at Artspace. For the sporty and bookish, please join us for precarious ping pong, drinks, half time snacks and a Reading Room selection by artist Richard Frater.

Since 2006 Artspace has offered a Reading Room which provides visitors a substantial resource of current local and international contemporary art publications. The Reading Room was established to facilitate and enable creative research. The Reading Room is available for research during gallery hours. We host an Open Late as part of First Thursdays. Coffee, tea or a glass or wine is provided for all readers. Reading groups and social readers most welcome!

First Thursdays is an evening of community based events across 10 venues in K'rd.

Dane Mitchell presents part three of Radiant Matter at Artspace in July, continuing his exploration into perfume and the ‘vaporous’, the state of suspension or in-between poetic potential of liquids, gases and solids. For this work he has collaborated with renowned French perfume maker Michel Roudnitska to develop a synthetic scent of 'the smell of an empty space'.

Dane Mitchell is one of New Zealand's most prominent artists on the international circuit, he recently completed the coveted DAAD Fellowship in Berlin, his work was featured in the 2010 Gwangju Biennale and will be included in the 2011 Singapore Biennale.

BOOK LAUNCH
ROMAN MITCH
A BRIEF HISTORY OF CHESS
SATURDAY 28 MAY, 4PM

In parallel with the exhibition Caraway Downs, Roman Mitch has produced, not a catalogue, but a chess book. Please join us for the launch of A Brief History of Chess, this Saturday at Artspace.

CARAWAY DOWNS
7 MAY - 18 JUNE ►

ARTSPACE 
Level 1, 300 Karangahape Road
Newton | Auckland | New Zealand
+64 9 3034965|  www.artspace.org.nz
Tuesday - Friday 10-6 | Saturday 11-4
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ARTSPACE receives major public funding from  Creative New Zealand

Paulo Venancio Filho is an art critic, curator and full professor of art history at the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro. He is the author of essays published in the following catalogues: Tunga/Cildo Meireles, Kanaal Art Foundation, Belgium; Transcontinental: Nine Latin American Artists, New York and London; Inside the Invisible, The Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston; Experiment/Experiência - Art in Brazil 1958-2000, Museum of Modern Art, Oxford; Oiticica in London, Tate Modern, London. He curated Rio de Janeiro 1950-1964 for Century City, Tate Modern, London 2001 and Soto: The Construction of Immateriality, Centro Banco do Brasil, Rio de Janeiro 2005.
 
Paulo Venancio Filho’s visit to New Zealand is supported by the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro; Adam Art Gallery, Victoria University of Wellington; the National Institute of Arts and Industry, University of Auckland, and the Govett-Brewster Art Gallery, New Plymouth
 

ELAM SCHOOL OF FINE ARTS LECTURE THEATRE
20 WHITAKER PLACE
GROUND FLOOR BUILDING 432
 

ARTSPACE 
Level 1, 300 Karangahape Road
Newton | Auckland | New Zealand
+64 9 3034965|  www.artspace.org.nz
Tuesday - Friday 10-6 | Saturday 11-4
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ARTSPACE receives major public funding from  Creative New Zealand

 Call for applications

The Artspace internship offers someone with a commitment to curating the opportunity to learn in a 12-month mentored relationship with incoming Artspace Director Caterina Riva. The successful candidate will be proactively assisting in the implementation of our annual programme of activities.

The ideal person is passionate about contemporary art, taking the initiative when required and willing to take on diverse tasks and able to work in a small dedicated team. Preferably you will have an art history or fine art background, a proven talent for writing and a strong desire to be involved in contemporary art. Some degree of technical or practical experience would also be an asset.

The candidate will:

• Absorb, enquire and extend themselves as an active contributor to the Artspace community.

• Provide a critical sounding board for the Director as they research and produce exhibitions, essays and concepts.

• Actively take part in all stages of the exhibition process from the conceptual planning through physical installation to promotion and administration.

The internship culminates in the curation of an exhibition at Artspace.

This is a one-year, fixed-term training position, which receives a small remuneration. It is 35 hours per week including Saturdays and commences in July 2011.

You must be a New Zealand citizen or resident to apply.

Applications close 10 June 2011

Forward your CV and a brief statement on your motivations and aspirations for the future to:

ARTSPACE 2010 Internship
PO Box 68418
Newton
Auckland 1145

or email your application to anna@artspace.org.nz

Please download the position description and remuneration ►

If you require any more information please contact Anna Gardner at Artspace, on 09 303 4965 or via email anna@artspace.org.nz

ARTSPACE 
Level 1, 300 Karangahape Road
Newton | Auckland | New Zealand
+64 9 3034965|  www.artspace.org.nz
Tuesday - Friday 10-6 | Saturday 11-4
Follow us onTwitter Like us on Facebook
ARTSPACE receives major public funding from  Creative New Zealand

Please join us for a talk this Saturday. New Plymouth based artist David Clegg's work 'the miserable idea of measurement' is an investigation into the recently cleared out archive room that is situated in a newly opened annex of Artspace. Dubbed by Clegg as an ‘elevated bunker’, this intriguing space is both the subject and site of his project. The site’s non-status as an archive is appropriate as the artist’s project develops from a set of ideas from his 2002 and 2005 projects imaginary museum and archivedestruct. ►

Artspace and The Film Archive present a special screening of selected film and video documentation of performance art from the 1970s. The dematerialized nature of Post-Object art has necessitated a particularly conscious relationship with its documentation. To coincide with the re-staging and re-interpretation of Jim Allen’s exhibition Contact : 2011, Campbell Farquhar will present selected excerpts of performative film and documentation of works from the Film Archive's collection, comparing them and analysing the complexities of performance art in the 1970s in New Zealand.

The programme includes:

Bruce Barber
Phil Dadson
Andrew Drummond
Leon Narbey
Gray Nicol
David Mealing

Image: David Mealing, Breadline, 1978

ARTSPACE 
Level 1, 300 Karangahape Road
Newton | Auckland | New Zealand
+64 9 3034965|  www.artspace.org.nz
Tuesday - Friday 10-6 | Saturday 11-4
Follow us onTwitter Like us on Facebook
ARTSPACE receives major public funding from  Creative New Zealand

“I am delighted Jeena is undertaking this residency, it represents a significant acknowledgement of the major site specific projects she has undertaken locally and provides an opportunity for her to extend her practice internationally.” Says Annie Bradley, Interim Director Artspace

Jeena’s recent works utilise not only existing structures but the natural properties of light spilling in through windows, building up her trademark geometric planes in finely nuanced colour gradations, making each visit an experience of subtle perceptual change.

Jeena Shin was born in Korea in 1973, and graduated with a Masters of Fine Arts from RMIT, Melbourne, in 2001, and a Bachelor of Fine Arts from the University of Auckland in 1997. Her work has been included in such group exhibitions as Prospect 2007: New Art New Zealand, City Gallery Wellington, SNO23, Sydney Non Objective, Sydney, Respirator, Conical Gallery, Melbourne, and Wall Works, Adam Art Gallery, Wellington. Jeena Shin is represented by Two Rooms Gallery, Auckland.

AUT►
Asia Foundation►
Creative New Zealand►

ARTSPACE 
Level 1, 300 Karangahape Road
Newton | Auckland | New Zealand
+64 9 3034965|  www.artspace.org.nz
Tuesday - Friday 10-6 | Saturday 11-4
Follow us on Twitter Like us on Facebook
ARTSPACE receives major public funding from  Creative New Zealand

Artspace welcomes Stephen Cleland and Vanessa Coxhead, two of the staff members of the Physics Room, Christchurch. Currently The Artspace Reading Room provides a makeshift office for them to run their operations from while their building in Christchurch CBD is inaccessible. All of their staff and board members are safe and at last sighting their building was still intact however a full inspection will be conducted in the coming weeks.
 

Please join their Facebook group for further updates on their movements: 

http://www.facebook.com/home.php#!/group.php?gid=305426350045


Artspace's reading room has undergone a new incarnation. The reading room was set up as a resource for the local art community and as part of our focus towards research and development.

The Reading Room project is a large undertaking and is the responsibility of the curatorial intern, Roman Mitch. Part of Roman's role involves coordinating the reading room as well as acquiring books for the collection. What was once a book colour coded system has been transformed into a comprehensive digitised catalogue with an easy to use classification system. Categories include 'literature/theory/ history/philosophy', 'international monograph', 'artist project/group catalogue'. Roman has also been working on an online catalogue so that visitors can use the reading room in the same manner libraries operate.

The initial aim of the reading room was to act as a response to the dearth in publicly accessible contemporary art publications. Located next to the Artspace office, the Reading Room offers a wide range of contemporary art material for perusal, including catalogues, monologues, artists’ books periodicals, videos, DVDs and music. This is the only resource of its kind in New Zealand.  We regularly updates the publications in the Reading Room in order for the most current and relevant material to be made available.  

As Artspace is not a collecting institution, we will donate out-of-date books, catalogues and periodicals to a library or school. In this way our resource stays current and we can donate a rich archival collection to somewhere it will be  utilized.

The Artspace reading room has been furnished by Buchanan Lowe and is generously funded by the Chartwell Trust. Visitors are also welcome to make themselves  L'affare coffee on our coffee machine for koha.

Vera Mey
Education and Media Intern
 

Behind the lens of the photoshoot were award winning industry experts Karen Inderbitzen-Waller and Avril Planqeel (best fashion photography and styling Metro Magazine 2010). To rock these excellent designs we had; model Veronica Crockford-Pound of Sue Crockford Gallery; Henry Oliver, co-owner D.O.C bar and influential fashion blogger Isaac Hindin Miller. The assemblage of art and fashion people in this shoot reflects a wider cultural shift towards crossover collaborations between the two fields.

Artspace Director Emma Bugden says "It's exciting to produce an edition which is accessible for more people to own. These Tee Shirts transcend the boundaries between fashion and art, this direction aligns with Artspace’s interest and influence on the wider cultural industry which fashion is part of".

Artspace is a public gallery and charitable trust. All proceeds from the Tee Shirts will go directly into the production of new artist’s projects.

Image: John Reynolds worn by Veronica Crockford-Pound, Michael Harrison worn by Henry Oliver and Sean Kerr worn by Isaac Hindin Miller. Photographers Karen Inderbitzen-Waller and Avril Planqeel.

For our visit to the school Sean talked to the young and eager students about sculpture and the idea of cause and effect, something which is central to his work. We then watched a video of the work by sculptors Fischli and Weiss. After this the students then enthusiastically experimented with making one minute sculptures using materials from around the classroom. Part of the experimentation process means that, on occasion, experiments fail. It was interesting to see the different approaches the students took, from stacking piles of chairs on top of each other to balancing on a single leg on a plank in the sand pit. After numerous attempts there were many successful sculptures produced; objects which took on an anthropormorphic form through the use of gloves and shoes, all cleverly composed. 

The second visit consisted of the kids visiting Sean's show here at Artspace. I read them 'Let's get art' by Brad Irwin and we talked about what contemporary art could be. We further discussed some of the ideas from Sean's work and had an interesting discussion on materials and the changing properties of sculpture. The students were all extremely intelligent in their observations of Sean's work and interacted with the art in a very close and personal manner. 

This was a unique and interesting education programme for Artspace, unlike any other education things we've done before, in terms of both content and audience. Thank you to Sean Kerr and Timitanga Community School for a wonderful learning experience. 

Vera Mey

Education and Media Intern