Art All 102

art all

artists alliance magazine issue 102 / autumn 2011

artists alliance

Artists Alliance is a non-profit organisation established in 1991 to represent and advance the professional interests of the visual artists of Aotearoa New Zealand.

Features

Staff Executive Director and Managing Editor: Maggie Gresson Administrator: Amberleigh Carson Education Programmes Manager: Jude Nye

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Board

Festivals 2011 Pasifika, Auckland Arts, and Fringe

John Eaden, Karl Chitham, Margaret Malaghan Evotia Tamua, Matt Blomeley, Juliet Monaghan

Acknowledgements Artists Alliance acknowledges the support of: Artstation, Studio Art Supplies and Auckland City Council

Address 1 Ponsonby Road, Newton, Auckland

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Ph (09) 376 7285, Fax (09) 307 7645 admin@artistsalliance.org.nz

Five questions Five Artists Alliance members from different New Zealand locales

www.artistsalliance.org.nz www.watchthisspace.org.nz This issue and more at: www.artistsalliance.org.nz The opinions expressed in this magazine are not necessarily those of the Editor or the Artists Alliance Board.

Artists Alliance recommends that our members join www.thebigidea.co.nz

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ISSN 1177-2964 Design: Verso Visual Communications

Mangere Arts Centre – Ng¯a Tohu o Uenuku

Printing: Soar Print, Auckland Artists Alliance receives significant funding from Creative New Zealand and ASB Community Trust.

Front cover: Pasifika.

Image courtesy Auckland Council.

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Professional development

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11

5 First up

9 Opportunities Awards, residencies and exhibitions

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Bill Cooke

issue 102 / autumn 2011

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In every issue Editorial

artists alliance magazine

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One for you, one for me Gary Peters finds a way to make his art pay for itself

Art and the internet Your legal rights in the online environment

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26

Dr Paynt Take the weather with you

20 Artists Alliance Mentoring Programme

Fale Pasifika A new residency programme for heritage artists

27 Regional arts worker Ole Maiava

30 Postcard from Seville Emma Pratt

Publishing schedule 2011

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#103 Winter 2011 Booking deadline: April 29 Copy deadline: May 13 Distribution week: May 30 #104 Spring 2011 Booking deadline: July 15 Copy deadline: July 29 Distribution week: August 15 #105 Summer 2011 Booking deadline: October 28 Copy deadline: November 11 Distribution week: November 28

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From the editor Hoping for good news …

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As we were going to press news of the devastating Christchurch earthquake reached the Artists Alliance offices. As I write this just over 24 hours after the first shock, news of friends, members and colleagues is still sketchy. We can only hope for good news in the days to come.

We had planned to feature the 6th SCAPE Biennial in our Festival feature on page 16. SCAPE due to run March 4 – April 17 had been rescheduled after the September 2010 earthquake. The Festival story has had to be reshaped and on page 19 is an image of the proposed permanent Anton Parsons work Passing Time. We have other Christchurch based contributors in this issue: Art and Industry Biennial Trust Director Deborah McCormick nominates her top five public artworks on page 6. In ‘Five Questions’, beginning on page 12, Jane Zusters talks

about her work and how she is exhibiting photographs from the September Earthquake at Sanderson Gallery in Auckland in April.

Our thoughts are with all our Christchurch friends, members and colleagues at this difficult time.

Elsewhere in this issue, we have a bit of a Pasifika focus: the well-loved Auckland Pasifika Festival on page 16; the Mangere Arts Centre – Nga¯ Tohu o Uenuku on page 21; Fale Pasifika on page 26 and Pasifika Festival Director Ole Maiava on page 27.

David McLaughlin deals with art, copyright and the internet on page 25; the opportunities and the pitfalls – more to come in the next issue of Art All. If you are looking for an innovative marketing idea then read Gary Peters on page 11. I signed up for the ‘One for you, One for me offer’, and was very pleased with the results. I have to confess to being one of the collectors with my work sitting

on a bookcase, but I have almost made my decision and will be sending Gary a photograph soon!

Maggie Gresson

First up up the public programmes of the gallery and, with Jamie taking over the reins, we are looking forward to consolidating and expanding these. As well as ensuring The Blue Oyster continues to be a place to come and see new art and innovative practice, we want to enhance our reputation for stimulating critical debate, reflection and engagement with the arts amongst the wider community.’

Blue Oyster appoints Director An arts writer who started a gallery for emerging artists has been appointed the new Director of Blue Oyster Art Project Space in Dunedin.

Jamie Hanton established The Hype Initiative at Space Gallery, Christchurch, in 2006 with the aim of representing newlygraduated artists, which ran for two years.

Since 2006 Hanton has also been an arts reviewer for the Christchurch Press and Art New Zealand, and last year completed an Honours degree in Art History and Theory at the University of Canterbury.

‘This is an exciting opportunity for me. The Blue Oyster is in a wonderful position to engage with a broad audience and win new local audiences for art with its programme of innovative contemporary exhibitions. I firmly believe that art should be for everyone and I’m eager to encourage local participation in The Blue Oyster. I’m also very much looking forward to moving to Dunedin, which has

ARTSPACE announces new Director Jamie Hanton

a reputation as a lively and interesting part of New Zealand’s arts community,’ said Hanton.

Blue Oyster Arts Trust Chairman Dr Jonathan Marshall said that the Trustees were very pleased to have secured a director of Hanton’s calibre.

‘The previous Director, Janine Parkinson, did a great job in building

Artspace has announced the appointment of incoming director Caterina Riva. She joins after three years as the co-director and curator of FormContent, an innovative not for profit space she co-founded in East London (www.formcontent.org).

‘I am extremely excited by this new professional and personal challenge and very humbled by my appointment. I am looking forward to coming to New Zealand and starting work at Artspace, where I will be presenting a lively programme

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responsive to the local community as well as projected towards international visibility and recognition.’

Caterina Riva (b. 1980, Varese, Italy) is a curator who has been based in London since 2006. She studied in Italy and the UK where she received her MFA in Curating at Goldsmiths College, University of London. Over the past three years at FormContent, her artistic programme has focused on exploring curatorial and artistic strategies, combining exhibition making, independent publishing and the production of events and performances, to critical acclaim.

Riva has worked on a number of notable exhibitions, including The young people visiting our ruins see nothing but a style, at GAM, Turin, Italy (2009), The Responsive Subject at MuZee, Ostend, Belgium, (2010), and The Filmic Conventions at FormContent, London (2010). Previously she was the coordinator of the Advanced Course in Visual Arts for Fondazione Ratti in Como, Italy, from 2004 to 2008 working alongside young international artists and distinguished visiting professors such as Alfredo Jaar, Marjetica Potrc, Joan Jonas and Yona Friedman.

She was an international delegate for the Edinburgh International Art Festival (2009), participated to the 6th Berlin Biennale’s curatorial workshop (2010), and was curator in residence at Gertrude Contemporary, Melbourne, Australia (2010). Riva has contributed as a writer to a number of artists’ books

A snapshot of shows WAIKATO: New Romantics

Caterina Riva

and publications, and to magazines such as Flash Art (IT), Kunstbulletin (CH), Un Magazine (AUS), Catalogue (FRA), Mousse (IT) and Kaleidoscope (IT).

Artspace Chair William Somerville says: ‘We are delighted to appoint Caterina Riva, who stood out within a highly qualified and talented field of applicants as the best person to lead Artspace for the next three years. We were impressed by the intelligence and sophistication of her curatorial vision, and her proven ability through her highly regarded contributions to FormContent.

Her curatorial perspectives align well with Artspace’s role as an international contemporary art space whose projectcentred programme contributes greatly to sustaining and developing contemporary art practice in New Zealand.’

Artspace farewells Emma Bugden, the current Director, who is leaving in March to take up the position of Senior Curator and Programme Manager at the Dowse Art Museum, Wellington.

New Romantics is an exhibition that explores themes of danger, mystery and desire, reflecting stories that have the potential to thrust the viewer into unknown territories and strange scenarios. Tattooed women, healing crystals and primitive idols could easily be associated with the clichéd renderings of the ‘dark romance’ genre. However, New Romantics is an alternative to this highly glamorised portrayal, offering insights into ritual and the human condition.

Open from May 7 – June 19 Weekdays, 8am – 6pm Calder & Lawson Gallery, Wel Energy Academy of Performing Arts, Gate 2b, University of Waikato.

New Romantics features works by Emma Smith, Graham Fletcher, Zina Swanson, Sam Mitchell, Niki Hastings-McFall and Kathryn Tsui.

WELLINGTON: Bruce danced if Victoria sang, and Victoria sang; so Bruce danced. Sean Kerr at the Dowse.

Leading digital artist brings misbehaving machines back to the Hutt. An inflatable finger (which deflates as you approach it), a sneezing computer, a giant nose, a ghost that follows you around, a sub woofer fart and a thing stuck inside a

Top five public artworks from New Zealand and abroad 1. Anish Kapoor’s Cloud Gate, Chicago, USA 2. Bill Culbert, Blue 2000, Christchurch Convention Centre http://www.scapebiennial.org.nz/permanent-work/blue-2000 3. C hoi Jeong Hwa, Lyon Flower Tree, Lyon, France http://choijeonghwa.com/ 4. Neil Dawson, Ferns, Civic Square, Wellington

Selected by Deborah McCormick Director, Art and Industry Biennial Trust

5. Christian Jankowski, Living Sculptures, Caesar, Dali Woman, El Che, Public Art Fund – New York, USA http://publicartfund.org/pafweb/projects/08/jankowski/ jankowski-08.html

locker trying to escape are just some of the delights in store for visitors to The Dowse in Lower Hutt when Sean Kerr’s new show opens on March 19.

The Dowse in Lower Hutt When: Saturday March 19 – Sunday May 29 SOUTHLAND: Janet de Wagt – Vocation Location February 11 – March 20 Gallery Three

The Artists Alliance website lists most upcoming shows throughout NZ – go www.artistsalliance.org.nz and click on ‘What’s On’ or check the homepage daily for ‘Opening Tonight’.

(more an observation than a poem)

Not your usual ‘How to do it’ book and much thicker than one would expect.

‘The Ultimate Guide to Cunnilingus’ in the Art section at Border’s Bookshop on Lambton Quay, squeezed in between ‘Drawing the head’ and ‘Painting your pets’ I could understand the relation between ‘Drawing the Head’ but ‘Painting your Pets?’

Unless it’s ... “Here pussy pussy.”

Of course I may be wrong relating it with its bookend neighbours, it might just have been put there by mistake.

Jim McGregor

Press release: the Molly Morpeth Canaday Award 2011 Evan Woodruffe won the Molly Morpeth Canaday Award 2011, worth $ 10,000, for his painting Untitled (02–14) on January 28.

‘In our digital age, when it no longer need record the natural world, painting must redefine its role in order to remain relevant as a 21st century art form.

Artists must use the medium to create something no other media can: celebrate its properties, its versatility, its unique energy.

The winning work does this masterfully. Its complex composition is filled with movement, tension and mystery. It offers texture and subtle variations in colour. It was not the work I immediately identified as the winner, but it was the one I kept coming back to, finding something new and engaging on each view, and the image remained with me long after I left it behind. For me, that’s the definition of art.’

– Jennifer Buckley (Judge 2011) Now in its 25th year, the Molly Morpeth Canaday Award is one of the longest running art awards in New Zealand.

Previous winners have included Peter Stichbury, Jenny Dolezel, and Peter Waddell.

Woodruffe won the Becroft Premier Award 2003 and has been a finalist in

several awards recently, most notably in the Wallace Art Trust Award, where his work was included in the travelling show.

He has held four solo exhibitions at OREX Gallery since 2003, with his fifth booked for this May. Woodruffe is known for his indepth technical knowledge and industry involvement, and has long been associated with art material specialists Studio Art Supplies. He is using the award to visit Germany later this year, where he will be furthering his knowledge

at artists’ colourmen Schmincke, brushmakers da Vinci, and checking out the art galleries of Berlin.

The work, which sold on the opening night before the announcement, will be displayed with the Highly Commended and Merit awardees, at the Whakatane Museum until end of March, when they will be displayed at the Rotorua Museum until mid-May. http://www.mollymorpethcanaday.co.nz/ selected-2011.html

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Clay and Fire – Ceramics from the Collection February 11 – March 27 Gallery Two Southland Museum and Art Gallery

But is it art

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Offers available while stocks last. Products may vary between stores. Sale ends 14 March 2011.

www.gordonharris.co.nz AUCKLAND: 4 Gillies Ave Newmarket Tel 09 520 4466 Open 7 Days

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Northridge Plaza Don McKinnon Dr The Albany Centre Tel 09 415 3406 Open 7 Days

31 Symonds St Auckland City Tel 09 377 9992 Open Mon - Fri

HAMILTON: 386 Anglesea St Hamilton Tel 07 834 3952 Open 7 Days

WELLINGTON: 170 Victoria St Wellington Tel 04 385 2099 Open 7 Days

CHRISTCHURCH: 145 Worcester St Christchurch Tel 03 377 3617 Open Mon - Sat

Wednesday, 16 February 2011 16:19 Composite

Opportunities Awards, residencies and exhibitions

This three day ceramic feast, to be held at Auckland’s Unitec campus will be of interest to all those interested in ceramics.

It is one of the most comprehensive and ambitious ceramic events to be held in recent times. The event will provide an academic and social agenda with keynote addresses, guest speakers, workshops, demonstrations, firings, great food, live entertainment, trade fairs and bus tours.

International and NZ ceramic artists, demonstrators and speakers will inspire with the latest techniques, new ideas and trends. Demonstrators include; Gustavo Perez (Mexico), Brian Adams (UK), Linda Christianson (USA), Paul Maysek (NZ), Peter Lange (NZ), Carla Ruka (NZ), Mike O’Donnell (NZ).

Registration fee of $280 for NZSP members includes; conference attendance, lunches and morning / afternoon tea and entry to opening of the National Exhibition and official welcome at the Marae.

Member $250, Non Member $290.

For more detail go to www.thebigsmoke. unitec.ac.nz or phone 0274867998 for a registration form.

2. A Fresh Approach: Drawing workshop for teachers (with Evan Woodruffe) Application deadline: April 12, 2011 Through using a wide range of materials and techniques, this workshop explores how to achieve a diverse range of outcomes, suited to both fine art and design related drawing projects. You will get hands-on experience using everything from powders to metal styli, different sorts of graphite and charcoal, markers, a variety of paper weights and surfaces, and much more. In the workshop participants will look at transfer drawings, preparatory drawings, subtractive techniques, mixedmedia, and visuals. The workshop comes

with outlines for teaching modules that are easy to implement in the class-room, plus examples of contemporary artists and technical information. Materials for the workshop will be supplied.

Evan Woodruffe is an artist, recipient of the Becroft Foundation Premier Award, finalist in the Wallace Award, Walker & Hall Award, and BMW Award, and is represented by OREXART Gallery in Auckland. Evan is a regular guest demonstrator at the tertiary art schools in Auckland, a regular columnist for the Artists Alliance, and a Board Member of the Uptown Arts Trust.

Havelock North High School, Te Mata Road, Havelock North 9am – 3pm Tuesday April 12, 2011 $120 + GST, includes a catered lunch.

3. NZ Art Show – Artists Wanted Application deadline: May 13, 2011 The NZ Affordable Art Trust presents The New Zealand Art Show 2011, TSB Bank Arena, Wellington, July 28 – 31, 2011 Applications are now open for New Zealand’s largest art sale. Open to all New Zealand artists. The emphasis is on high quality yet affordable art.

Applications and info: registration@artshow.co.nz phone: (04) 387 4370, www.artshow.co.nz Applications close: SAW & Solo Panel: March 31 General Exhibition: May 13

4. Step Up! and Re-Think Mental Illness Application deadline: April 30, 2011 The RETHiNK Grant has $15,000 to give away to innovative projects that will help Aucklanders better understand and accept people with experience of mental-health problems. The grant is all part of the National ‘Like Minds, Like Mine’ campaign to reduce the stigma and

discrimination associated with ‘mental illness’. A $15,000 grant is available for the best creative event, project, performance or idea. Kick your brain into action, dip your toe in at www.rethink.org.nz Grant applications open February 1 and close April 30, winners announced May 30. Contact: www.rethink.org.nz

INTERNATIONAL 5. University of Sydney SCA Graduate School: Call for MFA and Studio PhD Applications Application deadline: April 29, 2011 Sydney College of the Arts (SCA) is the visual arts faculty of the University of Sydney. The SCA Graduate School was established in 2007 and positions SCA at the forefront of contemporary art graduate programs in Australia and internationally.

The school offers MFA and PhD programs in contemporary visual art. The school also delivers a range of professional development Masters degrees in documentary photography, film and digital image, interactive and digital media, and studio art.

Applications are now open for graduate degree programmes commencing in July 2011. To discuss any of the graduate programmes offered at SCA or to arrange an interview during this period, email either brad.buckley@sydney.edu.au or colin.rhodes@sydney.edu.au.

Artists and theorists working across a wide range of disciplines are encouraged to apply.

Applications for July 2011 research degrees and coursework masters close April 29, 2011. Late applications are considered on a case-by-case basis.

For more information visit the SCA website http://sydney.edu.au/sca or email sca.enquiries@sydney

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1. THE BIG SMOKE Ceramics Conference 2011 APRIL 1 – 3

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One for you, one for me Gary Peters finds a way to make his art start paying for itself

Making the offer For the last year or so I’ve been sending out a weekly newsletter about my practice so it made perfect sense to exclusively launch the offer to my 50 newsletter readers: ‘If you, as a reader of my newsletter, cover the costs for me to make two small paintings, you’ll get one and I’ll get the other. Simple. Oh, and as I don’t know what my paintings will look like until I finish them, you won’t know what painting you’re getting. It’ll be a surprise.’

To make the offer as attractive as possible I kept the price as low as I could. $169 – just enough to cover my material costs and postage. After launching the offer ten people signed up – I’d sold ten paintings before I’d even made them! And one person asked if I’d be willing to make a diptych for $300. Intrigued by the challenge, I was happy to accept.

Making the work I now had the money to make 20 paintings. Time to deliver on my promise.

I found it was quite a different experience making work knowing that half of the pieces already had a home to go to. Not a bad thing – kinda awesome in fact – just different. I let the collectors know it would take me about six months to complete their paintings. As the work developed I kept both the collectors and

my newsletter readers up to date with my progress. The collectors also received individual emails.

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You know what it’s like. The never-ending challenge of finding a way to pay for your practice – the materials, the studio, the coffee. If only it could be easier. Last year I was determined to find a way to make my art start paying for itself despite only ever having sold two paintings in my so called ‘career’. I came up with the ‘one for you, one for me’ offer. With this in mind, I was able to pre-sell ten paintings and cover my material costs for ten more.

Here’s what I did…

Putting on a show All 20 paintings were exhibited in my studio prior to the ten going to their respective owners. On the opening night collectors’ pieces were marked with red pins. I picked the work at random prior to the show. If a collector wanted to know which painting was theirs I was happy to tell them.

Responses The collectors have loved their paintings, which is such a relief! Slowly the paintings are finding themselves places in people homes and lives. One collector has his painting in his workplace. Other pieces are sitting on bookshelves until they find their place. Where ever they end up I’m hoping to get photos from everyone, as it would be great to see the work in its new environment.

Gary Peters: Cavalcade, 250 x 200.

Acrylic on canvas, 2010.

Closing thoughts I’m so pleased I did this and overcame any doubts I had about the venture. I’ve now got ten paintings out in the world with ten proud owners. Each has a story to tell their friends (or anyone who will listen) about their little painting and how they came to acquire it through the ‘one for you offer’. It’s also a model I can use again for future projects. The benefits have been so much greater than simply covering my material costs. And while my art has yet to pay for itself fully, this has been a great first step.

Gary Peters: Hidden, 250 x 200.

Acrylic on canvas, 2010.

Interested in running your own ‘one for you’ offer?

You can download a free pdf report that goes into detail about what I did and how you can do the same. Download it from my website:

http://garypeters.info/one-for-you

Five questions Five Artists Alliance members from different New Zealand locales

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In our recent Art All readers’ survey, you told us you wanted to hear more about your artist peers. So, for this issue we spoke to five Artists Alliance members from different New Zealand locales, each with differing practices and approaches to their career.

What sort of work do you make and where are you based in New Zealand?

Jane Zusters: I am a multimedia artist, and right now I paint, take photographs, make short videos and are working on an installation piece for a group exhibition – opening in September, at the The Eastern Southland Gallery, Gore, about Seaward Bush. I live in Christchurch, which is my hometown.

Nigel Brown: I make acrylic and oil paintings, works on paper, and some work with found materials. My work has environmental and social concerns. The base for my work is where I live, the personal, from which I extend myself into wider issues developing a mix of archetypes – painterly totemic combinations and the schematic reinterpretation of

the seen. While I am often type cast as a New Zealand painter my influences are much more wide ranging. I live at Cosy Nook in a farming community, twenty minutes west of Riverton, south west of Invercargill, New Zealand.

Linda Bruce: I am primarily a maker of sculptural ceramics that are often combined with found objects and other media.

Hawke’s Bay has been my home for most of my life, and since marrying I have lived at Argyll, near Pukehou and Te Aute College, on the boundary between Hawke’s Bay and Central Hawke’s Bay. After years travelling 100km daily to a workshop in Hastings and the unrealistic cost of that travel and rent, a few years ago I shifted my kiln and accumulated stuff home to a small workshop on the farm Bob manages. Our two kids, their partners, and five – soon to be seven grandchildren – are here in Hawke’s Bay too.

Rebecca Mooney: I’m a painter by trade with outbursts of printmaking and drawing. The provincial city of New Plymouth is home.

Glen Hayward: I carve sculptures and paint them to look like realish, not relish, things; sometimes I change them a bit, from the real that is. Short answer Northland, long answer, where I live doesn’t really have a place name; I guess you could call it South Hokianga, although locally I say I am from the top of the Weka, you know, Mike and Janine’s old place.

What is the best thing (in relation to your practice) about being based where you are geographically?

Jane Zusters: I love the Canterbury light, nor’wester skies and the braided rivers. I like having the support of my family. My sister Susan has a business called Ruffell Productions and helps me with my video projects.

Nigel Brown: The best thing about Cosy Nook for me is you have plenty of space. Sixteen acres, with lots of room to build studios and storage, both new and using existing outbuildings.

In Auckland where I practised for nearly thirty years, space was always an issue and the economics and availability of space became untenable. The geographical environment and living by the sea is a constant stimulus.

Nigel Brown

Linda Bruce: Cutting the travelling is bliss but working from home has a different set of challenges – interruptions to help draft sheep, smokos and lunch at shearing time, family, and all those domestic chores that delay knuckling down to do the hard yards in the workshop – but the quiet and solitude provide a wonderful space for creativity. And not surprisingly a lot of my work is generated around rural and environmental issues with agricultural materials featuring in many recent works – lamb

is the number of collaborative projects undertaken by artists combining their particular skills and strengths.

Maree Mills, the new Director of the Hastings City Art Gallery is breathing life and energy into a gallery that is curating exciting exhibitions and increasingly stamping its mark in the region. A new retail exhibition space Awaha has recently opened at the gallery featuring furniture and object design. At present the Napier Museum and Art Gallery is closed until 2013 while a major redevelopment is under way. There are a few dealer galleries, mostly in Napier, and a potter’s gallery in Havelock North set up and run by four ceramicists that has celebrated a first birthday – so congratulations to them!

and calf teats, cattle ear tags, old totara fencing battens, gathered agricultural tools and implements. Belonging here geographically matters to me and is reflected in the work that comes out of me.

Rebecca Mooney: Maybe it’s the isolation, a destination, but the community has great pride and support for the artists living in and around New Plymouth. Along with this support we have an extraordinary landscape.

The internet and an efficient next day delivery service by an Auckland art shop means this physical isolation doesn’t mean a cultural isolation.

Glen Hayward: The most important requirements for my work are time and space, by living so far away from a centre it is inevitably cheaper, freeing up time from excessive revenue creation. The space comes from the distance regulating my engagement with the world. I am more able to do this on my own terms, which I find is healthier for me. This is probably because I have a tendency to be overly receptive to other people’s ideas and thoughts, particularly about what and how I should do things. Nothing really changes about the things I do, but I find it takes up too much mental energy arguing it away.

Glen Hayward: The local scene is quite active; the Hokianga is full of creative and talented people and as a community there is a general belief in the value of art for itself and it also operates as a catalyst for community. There are two main galleries one on each side of the harbour; also there are a number of outlets for craft / design and open studios. The Village Arts Gallery in Kohukohu is run as a trust and the Rawene Art Gallery is in the process of being set up as one. There is also an art school based in Rawene – these initiatives are creating quite an enchanting synergy.

How active is your local arts scene and how does it operate?

Jane Zusters: It is very active and multi layered and I often go to openings with art mates. Along with Sally Hope I founded a group of artists called ‘Artists for Save our Water’ who do art projects about water issues. Our next project is about the Hurunui River.

I enjoy working on projects with other artists.

Nigel Brown: I didn’t come here for the local art scene and haven’t the time to focus on it. Southland is a difficult environment from which to establish yourself because of a predominant amateurism and lack of critical standards. However, you have access to major landscape areas like Fiordland. Having the Riverton Arts Centre provides some life. At present I am organising a major show with the Southland Museum, which is heartening after ten years with nothing. A few artists such as Johnny Penisula give Southland substance and we have our own Hodges!

Linda Bruce: In the early 1990s I completed a three-year Diploma in Visual Arts and Design at EIT-Hawke’s Bay. The network of friendships from that time and the progression of students and tutors through the School of Art and Design since then form the core of my network of artists in the region. One thing notable here

Glen Hayward and Yertle.

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Linda Bruce

Rebecca Mooney: The art scene is very active on all levels from the spacious Real TArt community art gallery through to the Govett-Brewster Art Gallery. The main dealer gallery, KINA Art Space provides professional Taranaki and New Zealand artists with an exhibition space. There is a multitude of art practices in New Plymouth, including stone carving, street art (my favourite) and many initiatives organised by the artists themselves.

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Want to know how to make money from your ORIGINAL ART? Its Easy!!

1. Supply me the original.

2. I’ll photograph the art and reproduce onto stretched canvas 3. Sell the limited editions and keep the original!

COMPETITIVE PRICING WITH NO COMPROMISE ON QUALITY

a4 bw ad1.indd 1

8/07/2008 12:16:02 p.m.

when asked to. I haven’t exhibited internationally yet, but I am hoping to, I imagine that there is some apologetic quality to my work that I would like to shake off with international experience.

Thinking about the last question – how do you negotiate those different relationships?

Jane Zusters: I find I need to separate the art administration from being in the studio and making art. It is fatal to answer emails and phones if I want to create. I am a creative opportunist and many opportunities come from just getting out and living my life.

Do you exhibit locally / nationally / internationally (or all three)?

Jane Zusters: I exhibit and go all over the place. In March I am exhibiting Christchurch earthquake photos at the Sanderson Gallery, Auckland. In April I will be exhibiting photographs about the Murray River with digital montage artist Ramonda te Maiharoa at the University of Newcastle Gallery, Australia. In April I am teaching a painting workshop at the Wanaka Autumn Art School. In May I will be exhibiting at the Mark Hutchins Gallery Wellington and launching my book Singing in the Lifeboat.

Nigel Brown: I don’t generally exhibit locally, as time, dealer obligations and economics are against it. Queenstown and Dunedin are where people can find my work with Milford Galleries. Whitespace in Auckland is my new representation there. Williams Gallery in Petone out of Wellington has been a joy for me in recent years. I don’t at present exhibit Internationally in a significant way besides a peace show annually in Tokyo.

Linda Bruce: This year about half my work time will be spent at the School of Art and Design at EIT-Hawke’s Bay where I tutor working with clay and plaster – the basics of sculptural practice and processes. We have an amazing new Head of school in Suzette Major and a dynamic team of tutors and staff. Being part of a lively teaching team and interacting with students is a counter-balance for me to the solitary nature of creating and making work at home.

I exhibit locally and nationally, the main exhibitions last year being three major exhibitions at the Hastings City Art Gallery, and Sculpture OnShore at Fort Takapuna in November 2010, as well as several other group exhibitions around New Zealand. I am currently finishing work for another three exhibitions due by the end of February, and next month installing work at E:Scape at Waitakaruru Sculpture Park in Waikato. When I have time I supply several retail object specialist galleries with new works.

Linda Bruce: It can be tricky balancing many projects – teaching, exhibitions, commissions, school projects, council projects. Working ahead is important – compiling proposals, getting proposals out, being accepted – is months, sometimes a year or more before work is exhibited or commissioned. It helps to be canny, capable and confident in your work and abilities.

Not cocky confidant – I mean sure and true – trained, practised and powerful. As a tutor, I know that engendering a sense of self-belief is vital to a successful creative career – artistically and financially. A constant challenge but this is the work I want and love to do.

Rebecca Mooney: It’s simply about marketing yourself and being professional. Gone are the days of the ‘arty’ person who needs nurturing; though I’m certain there are still a few of those around.

Glen Hayward: I haven’t had to until now but my partner has made the observation that I no longer exhibit in the Thames Society of Art Annual Exhibition or enter the Kawerau National Woodskills Festival. I have high hopes but the deadlines come and go. I am at the point I think when I may have to more proactively say no, although I am not sure. I imagine sometimes that my job is to just make the best work I can… perhaps by relationships you mean people, and I think the best bet is to behave with as much integrity as I can muster and try to be sensitive to the people I meet, and I should be alright.

Rebecca Mooney: Although New Plymouth seems to have a bustling arts community and a supportive buyers’ market it is necessary to exhibit outside of the province to establish a professional reputation and an income.

Glen Hayward: Up until now I have exhibited where I am invited, or thought I had something to contribute; this seemed to keep me out of trouble. Which has been mostly nationally, as locally performs a different function for me, although I have exhibited

Rebecca Mooney

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Jane Zusters

Nigel Brown: The local is problematic for me in that I like to be involved and part of a community. However I’ve found it impossible to juggle alongside a National role with the demands of centres like Auckland, Wellington and Dunedin. So I’ve had to withdraw completely. I am running a lifestyle block, travel to Invercargill and elsewhere (which takes up a lot of time) and my work requires focus without interruption. I have concentrated on exhibiting throughout New Zealand and that has been demanding enough.

Festivals 2011

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Pasifika Pasifika Festival, the most significant cultural festival in the South Pacific, returns to Auckland from March 6 – 13 with a newly extended programme and a host of exciting events.

The festival has expanded to become a seven-day event across several venues and culminates in the popular and well-established festival day at Western Springs Park on March 12, where visitors can make the most of the week’s diverse free events, from dance, debate, delicious traditional foods, art, craft stalls, entertainment and more.

This increasingly popular festival attracts over 200,000 visitors each year.

Now in its 19th year, the festival has a different theme uniting the events and performances. This year its the Eke (Octopus) and the Taro plant.

Art is always a feature at Pasifika and

Pasifika. Image courtesy Auckland Council.

this year is no different. Master sculptors and carvers Filipe Tohi and Daryl Thompson will be joined by carvers from Kiribati and New Caledonia to carve the final Eke Pasifika Rock Sculpture from Monday March 7 to Saturday March 12 in Western Springs.

This is the final sculpture in the series which began four years ago at Pasifika Festival 2007. Over the years, a carver from each Pasifika Village has contributed to the artwork.

Four art exhibitions will also be open at the Aotea Centre. From March 6 – 13 Alter-native Surfaces presented

by Okaioceanikart Gallery features four Samoan abstract artists in the Aotea Gallery. Upstairs in the Air New Zealand foyer from Monday, March 7 to Friday, March 11 will be three art exhibitions from Niue, Auckland emerging artists and the Cook Islands.

Visit www.aucklandcouncil.govt.nz/events for more information.

Auckland Arts Festival International art stars Sarah Lucas (UK), Héctor Zamora (Mexico / Brazil) and Daniel Crooks (Melbourne-based New Zealander) headline a spectacular visual arts programme that cements Auckland Arts Festival as a national leader in festival visual arts programming.

Celebrated British sculptor, photographer and installation artist, Sarah Lucas (part of the notorious and celebrated YBAs – Young British Artists such as Damien Hirst and Tracey Emin who rose to prominence in the early 1990s) will be artist in residence at Two Rooms Gallery. Her works are characterised by confrontational humour, sexual puns and an ironic exploration of Englishness.

For the Festival, Lucas will show her recent NUDS, a new sculptural series that references the formative, genderorientated works of her early practice.

Héctor Zamora, one of the most exciting artists to emerge from Mexico in the last decade, will produce a unique site-specific work for the Festival. His practice encourages a re-imagining of public space by picking out particular environmental characteristics or patterns of use and working them into sculptures, architecture and public action. The community is drawn into his work, not just as spectators, but as active participants in its creation. Zamora will travel to Auckland to install his Festival work and will also participate in SCAPE in Christchurch.

Australian based Daniel Crooks returns to his home city to present two distinct works in very different Auckland venues. Crooks’ ongoing investigation of motion and time in public space is explored in a new series of stills for the street level Bledisloe Walkway Light Boxes. Two Rooms Gallery presents

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Static No 12 (Seek Stillness in Movement); HD; 16.9; 05.23 Min. Stereo; Courtesy of the artist and Anna Schwartz Gallery.

Crooks’ stunning film work Static No. 12 (Stillness Seeks Movement), previously shown at the 17th Sydney Biennial, along with two new works.

The international contingent also includes pioneering video artist, Ko Nakajima. In 1998 Nakajima was invited to New Zealand by TVNZ and commissioned to create a work for the programme Kaleidoscope. He was the first internationally acclaimed video artist to visit the country and the computer-graphic video piece he made, RANGITOTO, was the first piece of video art to be broadcast full-length on national television. Nakajima returns to New Zealand with his young protégé, Kentaro Taki, and both will lead a workshop and participate in public conversations as well as exhibiting their work.

The visual arts programme also features the work of artists from South Africa, UK, Cuba and Australia and includes works as diverse as an exhibition of Aboriginal painting from the Mornington and Bentinck Islands and an intriguing look behind the scenes of Nigeria’s famous B-grade films industry (the third largest in the world).

Local artists also feature prominently in the programme. Leilani Kake’s Ng¯a Hau e Wh¯a – The Four Winds, is a powerful new piece from the Manukaubased artist that investigates the cultural taboo of nudity and explores the politics

and histories related to perceptions of the body for Maori ¯ and Pacific women. This provocative video installation was inspired by startling statistics that revealed the unusually high incidence of preventable cancers in Maori ¯ and Pacific Island women.

New Zealand’s ceramics tradition is celebrated with a retrospective of master maker Richard Parker at Objectspace, and an exhibition that looks at the groundbreaking work of the Auckland Studio Potters. Jim Allen will re-perform, at Artspace, his seminal performance work from 1974, Contact. A special edition of Viewfinder, and new works by Finn Ferrier and Letting Space will take art into the streets.

Other participating artists include: Alicia Frankovich (Melbourne / Berlin / NZ), Laresa Kosloff (Melbourne) and Ruth Proctor (London), John Malcolm (UK / NZ), Center for Land Use Interpretation CLUI (USA), Josephine Starrs and Leon Cmielewski (Australia), and FLY-TOWER, featuring selected performance artists and designers from across New Zealand.

The 2011 Festival will also see the first Australasian White Night event. The first White Night (aka Nuit Blanche) was held in Paris in 2001 and has spread through the world’s cultural capitals.

White Night events are celebrations of visual arts, where galleries and museums stay open late into the night – often all

night – with special programming that transforms the central city into a huge art gallery. For one night only, March 12, the Auckland Museum, the Auckland Art Gallery, MOTAT, Voyager Maritime Museum, the Central City Library and numerous other public and dealer galleries will keep their doors open late, hosting exhibitions, performances, music, and other events that will spill out onto the city’s night time streets. Free buses will connect the key arts precincts.

See the full programme: www.aucklandfestival.co.nz

Auckland Fringe is back Time machines, failed rock bands, surprising lift encounters, jelly setting, water nymphs, Shakespeare, the Chatham Islands, speed dating and a men’s knitting group. Yep – they are all in the Auckland Fringe! The second ever Auckland Fringe runs from February 25 – March 13. It will sprawl its way around the Auckland region from the Waitakere Ranges to Waiheke Island.

For two weeks over 100 events will be squeezed into theatres, gardens, galleries, lounge rooms, lifts and alleyways. Artists from across the country and from the international stage will present fresh,

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creative work that is guaranteed to entertain audiences from Auckland’s North, South, East and West. The shows will range from the hilarious and absurd, to the touching and heart warming, to the just downright entertaining!

The call-out to artists was made in June last year, there was a huge response from the Auckland arts community, with emerging performers and art practitioners wanting to share their diverse talents in cabaret / burlesque, comedy, dance, theatre, music, and visual arts, which has resulted in an immensely varied and interesting programme.

The first Auckland Fringe in 2009 had impressive audience numbers, with 10,000 paid ticket buyers watching 75 shows performed by 900 artists, with an estimated 30,000 people accounted for in non-ticketed (free or koha) events.

Auckland Fringe 2011 looks to eclipse those figures and continue to grow within the city. In addition to the huge line up of shows, 2011 also sees two new initiatives take place – an opening weekend event, Fringe in the Park, at Myers Park on February 26 to kick off the Festival, and a Fringe Awards Ceremony at the end of the Festival; these inaugural awards will recognise the Fringe artistic endeavours and excellence.

Events around the city that will kick the Auckland Fringe into gear include:

Opening event Fringe in the Park Myers Park February 26, 2pm – 6pm. Free Installations, live opera, pole dancing and hula hooping in the sunshine, an opportunity to be part of a live art project and masses of performances by Auckland Fringe acts. There will also be a horse and cardboard box war!

Auckland Fringe on Waiheke Stefanos Restaurant Waiheke Island February 25 – March 13 DJ dance nights, acapella choirs, clowns and children’s story telling, improvised theatre, a sizzling burlesque show, and live music featuring Waihetian mambo jazz band Chocolate Fish and acoustic blues rock favourites The Mojo Risers.

Pacific Fringe Mangere Arts Centre February 25 – 27 A weekend of Pacific performance, visual art and tradition. Take this

opportunity to experience the richness of South Auckland’s Pacific diaspora with this weekend packed full of art and entertainment.

Soul Sessions Myers Park Saturday March 5 Midday – 6pm Check out a bunch of established and emerging artists featuring members of the Cut Collective, Cinzah Merkens and others, painting live to a soundtrack provided by Peter Mac, Ed G and more.

It’s a chance to soak up contemporary, artistic action and sweet sounds in one of the CBD’s finest parks.

This is just a small taste of the wild assortment of entertainment that is on offer this year in the Auckland Fringe.

For more information: www.aucklandfringe.co.nz

Blindfolds, country music comedians, rockabilly gypsy punk and tape artists....

Dunedin showcases art, innovation and experimentation in the South Island’s only Fringe Festival.

The 2011 Dunedin Fringe Festival has attracted over 50 comedy, music, dance, theatre and visual art acts. The Festival’s fun and quirky new branding campaign, ‘Find Your Fringe’, featuring a lady in a blindfold, conveys exactly what the whole festival is about – getting outside your comfort zone and experimenting with art and culture on the Fringe.

During the Fringe Festival the picturesque and compact city of Dunedin is literally taken over by artists and Fringe celebrations. Dunedin has long had a reputation for innovation in the arts, a city of just over 100,000 including 20,000 students ensures an ample base of fresh new talent.

The Octagon, in the heart of the city, is transformed into a stage for the ‘Pick of the Fringe’ free lunchtime performance

series, and cheeky performers can be regularly seen out and about causing havoc in the city. Event venues have been carefully chosen to showcase the abundance of heritage buildings and quirky hot spots around the city.

What makes the Dunedin Fringe so unique is its focus on experimentation.

A noncurated Festival, the Fringe has an open access artist policy. Many acts and exhibitions hold their world premiers at the Dunedin Fringe. For the first time the percentage of touring artists, 55 percent, in the Fringe Festival has outstripped local acts. ‘The Dunedin Fringe has built a reputation as a launching platform for emerging artists, we’ve had tons of artists launch their careers here and go on to tour extensively internationally’, said Paul Smith, Festival Director.

The 2011 Festival has attracted its best ever line-up of music and comedy acts. In keeping with Dunedin’s rich history as a music hub, the Festival presents bi-annual experimental music event ‘Lines of Flight’ which will be held in Port Chalmers over three days. The 2011 Festival also features a particularly strong showing in visual arts, with over a dozen different visual arts events registered. Ranging from the re-creation of a nostalgic piece of Dunedin graffiti that has long since disappeared; to ‘Half’, a collaborative work by the members of The Branch – a collective of eight young artists, filmmakers and musicians. In fact the Fringe Festival is being opened by one such event, Tape Art Duo Erica Duthie and Stuan Ashby of Wellington will be creating two amazing Tape Art Installations, one at the University of Otago and the other prominently displayed in the Octagon, the heart of the city.

‘Our Festival programme is huge, talented and diverse. We have been able to support dozens of artists to create new work and provided travel assistance to many high quality touring acts. The Dunedin Fringe is a wonderful opportunity for the public to try something new and exciting,’ said Smith.

The 2011 Dunedin Fringe Festival will be held from March 17 – 27 with the full programme launched on February 17.

The event, which includes all art forms, will be the eighth fringe festival held in Dunedin since it was founded in 2000.

Full programme information and artist profiles can be found at: www.dunedinfringe.org.nz

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Anton Parsons, Passing Time, 2010 / 11, artist’s visualisation. Commissioned by CPIT and Christchurch City Council with generous support from CPIT Foundation. Installed in 2011 for the 6th SCAPE Christchurch Biennial of Art in Public Space.

Take the weather with you

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The lovely humid weather that we have year-round can cause problems with your drawing and painting supports, let alone your creative stamina!

Papers absorb moisture from the air and the fibres swell and soften. On really humid days, this can cause the paper to buckle, and it will feel limp and lifeless; the paper is more easily damaged by working roughly with pencil or charcoal and eraser.

Paper and board taken from one climate to another, from the artist’s studio to an air-conditioned space, for instance, can take up to 72 hours to re-acclimatise.

Canvas can be more obviously affected. In high humidity, linen fibre swells and the threads fatten and shorten. A linen canvas stretched nice and tight on a wet day can become limp and ripples can appear when the humidity drops.

The opposite tends to happen with cotton canvas. As cotton is made of short fibres, these expand in humid weather, and a nicely stretched cotton canvas often becomes limp on a humid day.

All this would be fine if artists using linen canvases only had them stretched on dry days, and those working on cotton canvas had theirs made on wet days!

An easy fix for a slack canvas made with an expandable frame, is using wooden wedges, which are tapped into the inside corners, driving the stretcher bars apart and so increasing the tension. Care is advised, as this can knock the canvas frame out of square. It is also recommended that the tension is not increased too much, as when the humidity level changes the increased tension can be too much for the frame, which will move. Uneven tension can also cause cracking and cupping in the ground and paint layers.

If a canvas has become too slack to work satisfactorily on, or has developed ripples, it is best to have the tension adjusted by gently re-stretching one or two sides of the canvas. Of course, before buying a pre-stretched canvas, give it a tap to ensure that it at least has good tension to start with.

High humidity can cause major problems with varnishing.

Moisture in the air can make spirit-based varnishes ‘bloom’ or become smoky. Avoid varnishing on wet days. Dry days are also best because you can have all the windows open, to get some ventilation.

If you’re working in a relatively small space, a de-humidifier can work wonders. For the rest of us, we are reminded that we are working with predominantly natural products that respond to differing natural conditions. An understanding of this helps us to respond appropriately. As a friend of mine said: ‘There is no such thing as bad weather, just the wrong clothing!’

Dr Paynt, Studio Art Supplies

The Artists Alliance Mentoring Programme Artists Alliance recently announced the launch of the 2011 Mentoring Programme. The aim of the programme is to provide a valuable opportunity for ten recent graduates to focus on their career with the help of an experienced mentor. The programme has been made possible with generous funding from the ASB Community Trust.

After a call for proposals in late 2010, ten ‘mentees’ were selected from a pool of high calibre applications. The process was extremely competitive and a large number of applications were received. The ten successful applicants were then each placed with a mentor who will work with them throughout 2011.

Mentors will provide advice and guidance in the following ways: • Providing advice about professional practice • Helping to develop the skills needed for effective networking; and approaching curators in public institutions and dealers in private galleries • Assisting with the completion of applications for exhibition involvement • Giving an open dialogue and practical direction for discussing ideas

• Giving mentees the confidence to pursue a career in the visual arts once they have left the supportive structure of the art school environment.

Mentor Pool – Who is guiding the future of New Zealand Art? The Artists Alliance Mentoring Programme has a large pool of mentors to draw on, which means each accepted mentee will be appropriately matched with the best arts practitioner in terms of what the mentee wishes to achieve.

The 2011 Artists Alliance Mentors are: Matt Blomeley, Deborah Crowe, Philip Dadson, Lyn Dallison, Judy Darragh, Scott Gardiner, Peter Madden, Leigh Martin, Jill Sorensen & Layne Waerea.

Complementary to the mentoring Programme is the Artists Alliance Internship Programme. The Internship Programme aims to provide a valuable opportunity for arts graduates to obtain significant work experience in the art industry. The programme has also been made possible with generous funding from the ASB Community Trust.

Artists Alliance will be calling for applications from recent graduates for eight fixed term, paid internships with

Auckland arts organisations throughout 2011. The first internships to be appointed thus far have been for the Auckland Art Fair, Art News magazine, The McCahon House Trust and The Wallace Arts Trust. All four positions offer an exciting opportunity for the selected graduates and an excellent ‘foot in the door’ into the New Zealand art industry.

Several more internships will be announced shortly; keep an eye on the Artists Alliance website for the call for applications.

Please note: These programmes are in their pilot year, therefore eligibility is restricted to graduates from the four Auckland art schools currently holding Artists Alliance membership.

Artists Alliance would like to see these programmes become more widely available in future and would especially like to offer similar programmes in other New Zealand centres.

If you are not eligible for a mentor / internship opportunity there might be other ways we can be of assistance. Please remember that a valuable part of Artists Alliance membership is our advisory services…make an appointment today by contacting the office.

Email: admin@artistsalliance.org.nz Phone: 09 376 7285

feature gallery

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Mangere Arts Centre – Ng a¯ Tohu o Uenuku What is Mangere Arts Centre – Ng a¯ Tohu o Uenuku’s vision and who are its ‘people’?

Our vision is to meet and exceed the expectations of the Mangere community. They first started advocating for an arts centre here almost 19 years ago. On the one hand, our vision is based on the community’s intentions to meet the needs of the culturally diverse and vibrant Mangere community and to become a source of great pride to Mangere. It’s also about creating ways of connecting Mangere with other New Zealanders, by showcasing Mangere as an important creative and cultural hub. As a reflection of the community, we have a particular focus on Maori and Pacific visual arts and performing arts – with the vision of developing a profile of national and international significance.

Across our gallery and theatre programming, we promote three key aspects: professional, community, and youth.

The local community is our primary audience, our supporters, critics and fans – they are a big part of our whanau.

But we also work with many artists from further afield across Auckland and beyond!

Your doors opened in September 2010, a time when Auckland was on the edge of becoming a ‘Super City’.

What impact (if any) has this had on the Arts Centre?

We were significantly the first ever purpose-built arts facility to be commissioned and constructed by Manukau City Council and the building was officially opened by then Mayor Len Brown on September 3, 2010. Now that we are part of the Auckland Council, we hope there will be ways we can work more directly and pro-actively with other venues and arts centres across the new city. However, our focus is first and foremost on Mangere and Otahuhu and neighbouring communities.

Will the Arts Centre be involved in the Pasifika Festival in any way? How do events like this impact your audience?

We’re not directly involved with the Pasifika Festival but it’s definitely a highlight on the annual calendar for many of the artists and performers that come from Mangere. The great thing

about Pasifika Festival is that it’s been going for a number of years, bringing together people from all parts of the city and walks of life.

We are holding the first Pacific Fringe as part of this year’s Auckland Fringe, so people can come and see something completely different and surprising! There will be Pigs in the Yard, a Tongan performance artist with live pigs; Mixed Nuts, contemporary Pacific dance; and Pacific Punch!, a variety evening; along with a painting installation by Ahota’e’iloa Toetu’u called The day that never came.

What’s the best thing about the Centre being located in Mangere, South Auckland?

The best thing is the people of Mangere and the place itself! We look out on the beautiful Mangere Mountain, with views just over the horizon to Rangitoto in the other direction. Mangere is full of interesting and friendly people, there is so much talent and potential here, it’s palpable. We’re very proud to be part of the Mangere community and to service the needs of this community.

What events and exhibitions have you got coming up over the next few months?

Highlights in the performing arts are Pacific Fringe, four days of events that are part of the Auckland Fringe 2011 programme that I mentioned above. Then in March, we have two featured events as part of the Auckland Arts Festival: Havoc in the Garden by Massive Company, and Who Are You? from Black Grace. In the gallery, our summer exhibitions are Tu te manu ora i te Rangi and The day that never came.

Opening in March is a show from Te Putahi a Toi at Massey University in Palmerston North. Featuring graduate students Jacob Davey, Rongomaiaia Te Whaiti and Kristy Theobald, the exhibition also includes work by staff, Robert Jahnke, Rachael Rakena, Ngataiharuru Taepa, Israel Tangaroa Birch and their 2011 Artist in Residence Shane Cotton. Later in May we have a solo exhibition by Ani O’Neill.

Naomi Singer, Manager Mangere Arts Centre – Ng a¯ Tohu o Uenuku Above: Mangere Arts Centre – NgaāTohu ¯ o Uenuku. Photo: Serena Stevenson.

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Art and the internet Part one: David McLaughlin looks at your legal rights in the online environment

some developing countries do not yet have as high regard for copyright rights as many western countries do, then you can see the potential for how problems could arise.

Although your rights in your artwork may be as solid in the online environment as they are in the real world, the issues related to policing and enforcing such rights in artwork made available over the internet does put the practical effectiveness of these rights into serious question in many cases. Indeed, at the end of the day some of the best protection may be to give careful consideration to what you actually choose to make available over the internet in the first place.

When it comes to the internet there are a lot of websites and applications that help to showcase artwork and also even just make the sharing of videos and images that much easier. This is an aspect to your art and internet that also needs careful consideration. All these websites and applications will have specific contracts you must agree to before you can make use of them. In some cases for higher end applications or web services you may be sent a physical contract and have to pay some form of fee to make use of the service. However, in many other instances when the application or use of the website in question is free there won’t be a formal contract as such. You may be sent an informal set of ‘Terms of Use’ or a ‘User Agreement’ you are deemed to accept if you make use of the website, or perhaps even a check box you have to tick to acknowledge you’ve supposedly read and agreed to be bound by these terms.

The danger here is that although hardly anyone reads these informal terms, at ‘law’ they are generally fully binding.

Many of these free websites that facilitate the promotion or sharing of images and video often include quite far reaching rights that allow them to make use, and even on licence to third parties the use of any material you upload. To ensure you are not giving much greater rights of use in your artwork than you intended, it always pays to make sure you do make the effort to review any applicable Terms of Use or User Agreements.

In the next edition of Art All we’ll be continuing the internet theme and looking at some of the considerations you need to bear in mind when looking to market and promote your artwork over the internet.

David McLaughlin is a specialist arts lawyer with Auckland law firm McLaughlin Law (www.mclaughlinlaw.co.nz). He can be contacted by email at david@mclaughlinlaw.co.nz or on 09 363 2038.

Disclaimer: This article is intended to provide a general outline of the law on the subject matter. Further professional advice should be sought before any action is taken in relation to the matters described in the article.

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In previous issues of Art All I discussed the basic rights you have in your artwork at law, thanks to the working of such legal concepts as copyright, and I also looked at some of the specific issues to be aware of when entering into contracts of different kinds with third parties in relation to your artwork.

In this edition of Art All I’m going to take a combined look at all of these topics in the context of the internet and discuss the ways in which the online environment brings a whole other set of considerations that need to be borne in mind when it comes to your rights.

The various intent specific issues are important for all artists to be aware of and not just those who create in the digital forms that obviously lend themselves well to reproduction via the internet. Whether you are merely uploading pictures of your sculpture or craftwork for show, offering specific digital copies of prints, or photographs for sale, you still need to carefully consider what implications your actions may have.

When it comes to the internet one of the first things that should be clarified is that copyright still exists in any artwork that you place copies of on the internet. A misleading urban myth that you sometimes hear, is that if you choose to place something on the internet then you have waived your copyright rights in such work. This is definitely not true and you can be assured that copyright provides exactly the same type of protection in the online environment as it does in the real world. Unfortunately, the technological ease with which images on the internet can often be copied and reproduced will often make it feel as though if no practical impediments exist to such actions then surely there can’t be any legal ones.

Although copyright may exist on the internet to exactly the same extent that it does in the real world there are some quite significant practical issues that still need to be considered. For example, the internet can be an incredible delivery platform for your work, literally making the images and files you post available anywhere in the world. This obviously has some amazing potential benefits but it does create some potential issues when it comes to trying to enforce your rights in your work. The anonymity of the internet can lead to less scrupulous people feeling more willing to take the chance in terms of copying, or otherwise infringing other rights you may have, than they possibly would in the real world.

If you add into this the person in question may be on the other side of the world – hence making any potential legal action or threats against them a lot harder (and potentially a lot more expensive) to co-ordinate, and also the fact that

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Fale Pasifika The Centre for Pacific Studies announces an exciting new residency programme for heritage artists In 2004, the second largest Fale (traditionally-styled Pacific meeting house) in the southern hemisphere was opened at the University of Auckland. Characterised by its open structure, the architectural design reflects the open nature of Pacific life and culture. In the setting of the university the Fale has become a symbol of identity for Pacific Island students and staff. It provides a home for ceremonies, a place for dialogue, teaching, and learning about the Pacific Islands. But a new initiative is about to be launched to further engage the Pacific Island community in events and activities onsite at the Fale. Nina Tonga, Programme Administrator for The Centre for Pacific Studies, University of Auckland has designed a residency programme based at the Fale to encourage and promote the use of the Fale to the entire Pacific community. The Heritage Artists in Residence programme establishes the Fale Pasifika as a dedicated site to facilitate and encourage the preservation of traditional knowledge through heritage art forms. This new programme offers Pacific Island heritage artists the opportunity to work full time on a project at the Fale Pasifika.

Due to launch in March the Pacific Heritage Artist in Residence Programme will host four groups of Pacific heritage artists (from NZ and the Pacific) throughout 2011. The artists will base their art practice at the Fale as part of a one month residency. Each residency will coincide with an extensive public programme of events and workshops designed to facilitate community access to heritage arts and engaging different sectors of the community. This new initiative aims not only to strengthen the heritage art forms of Pacific communities, but also to provide a gathering place for Pacific communities, and develop effective partnerships with the University’s local, national and international communities. It will also provide unique learning opportunities

for students and create the opportunity for the practice of Pacific languages.

Residencies are planned for April, May, August and September. The first residency hosts the Otaota Tahina Society, a group of Tongan women who specialise in making ngatu (traditional tapa). Normally based in Mt Roskill the group will set up residence in the University’s Fale which will be open to the public for the duration of the residency. Workshops will be offered in tapa making, and high school students will participate in Tongan language classes and making kupesi (design) boards for tapa.

In May a collective of Nuien weavers, led by Matafetu Smith, will take up the residency and host workshops for school children, language nests, and for the general community at large.

August sees tattoo artist Su’a Suluape Petelo move into the Fale for three weeks. During this time Su’a will tattoo PhD candidate Falaniko Toniniko with a full male tatau. The final Heritage artist in residence is Filipe Tohi who specialises in Tufunga Lalava (traditional lashing). While based at the Fale he will create a new work which will be installed at the university.

Again this residency will be supported with public lectures and workshops.

There will be official openings at the beginning of each residency. For further information about these events please contact: The Centre for Pacific Studies Phone: 09 373 7599 ext. 85893 Email: cps@auckland.ac.nz 20 Wynyard Street, Auckland Jude Nye

Regional arts worker Ole Maiava, Pasifika Festival Director What is your art practice?

I am a multi-disciplinary artist – I dabble in many art forms; literature, poetry, short stories and radio plays. I am a musician and composer, I sculpt rock, and am a audio visual artist – making documentaries etc. as well as an actor and spoken word performer and lately I have been painting canvas.

I am the Pasifika Festival director.

What is unique in your area?

I see myself as a sacrificial catalytic artist.

Local favourite artist?

Calen Paris – my eldest son who is an amazing tattoo artist.

What are you working on now?

A spoken word / multi-media interpretation of the poetry of seven women for Matariki.

What can’t you do without?

My camera.

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27 art all autumn 2011

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Bill Cooke The Evolution of Cultural Cringe

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I had a very interesting experience while viewing the European Masters Exhibition for the second time. I noticed how much I was enjoying the exhibition and how much it was repaying a second visit. But that wasn’t the interesting experience. The interesting experience was the momentary feeling of guilt about my enjoying the exhibition so much.

Was I enjoying it so much because it was a European exhibition? Or, to put it more pungently, was I revealing a deep cultural cringe.

I t’s an interesting notion, cultural cringe, and one that’s changed in subtle ways over time.

It’s an interesting notion, cultural cringe, and one that’s changed in subtle ways over time. As we know, it refers to the tendency to defer to all that is ‘from overseas’ and to look down at or, more usually, ignore, that which is homegrown. As Allen Curnow put it in one of his Whim Wham pieces: ‘Mere Folly gains Force / From an Overseas Source.’

Young countries like New Zealand are always going to suffer from this condition. One of the first to give voice against the practice was Denis Glover, whose poem ‘Home Thoughts’ finishes: I do not dream of Sussex downs Or quaint old England’s quaint old towns: I think of what will yet be seen In Johnsonville and Geraldine.

More recently, the term’s been taken on for duty among those keen to talk up anything ‘indigenous’ (a terribly loaded word). A few years ago Pita Sharples (note: not Peter) decried our preference for Plato over the no less compelling Maori mythological tales. I have yet to be unduly put upon by intrusive Platonists, but there you are.

Like every idea, cultural cringe has its moderate and literalist wings. The moderates are content simply to not automatically prefer that which is foreign to that which is home-grown. The more literalist interpreters are more inclined to slag off that which is foreign simply because it is foreign. Often the line between the two is very blurry. In the language of Glover’s poem, the literalist variation can quickly descend into ‘it’s not worth nothin’ if it ain’t from Johnsonville or Geraldine’.

We all know about the long and slow transition before we were getting a genuinely New Zealand art, an art that responded to the different light here than in the northern hemisphere, for example. Nineteenth century artists painted large romantic landscapes of New Zealand countryside with more consideration to the European conventions of romantic landscape painting than for the different light here. It took a long time for genuinely New Zealand conventions of art to work their way through.

But as we enter the twenty-first century, the century of globalisation and of the diminution of authority among autonomous nation-states, the notion of being ‘genuinely New Zealand’ is becoming a lot more fuzzy around the edges. The furore over Paul Henry’s comments about Anand Satyanand illustrated this very well. What’s (or who’s) distinctly kiwi in one set of eyes looks odd and foreign to another.

ut as we enter the twenty-first century, B the century of globalisation and of the diminution of authority among autonomous nation-states, the notion of being ‘genuinely New Zealand’ is becoming a lot more fuzzy around the edges.

In the face of these changes, our conceptions of cultural cringe have changed a bit as well. Recently, we’ve seen it expressed most frequently in the republican debate. With consciously shock-jock language, the republicans sneer at ‘Liz Windsor’ and ask what she’s got to do with us? We can’t call our house our own, so the argument goes, while Liz Windsor has a set of keys. Theirs is a literalist variation of cultural cringe thinking.

Given all this, it was very interesting that there were no cultural cringe-type effusions over these recent prominent exhibitions brought in from overseas. Ron Mueck’s exhibition in Christchurch drew sizable crowds, with no word of cultural cringe, either from the perspective of it being good because he’s from overseas, or that our attending in such large numbers is a sign of immaturity on our part. The same can be said of the European Masters Exhibition, which was at Te Papa from November through to February. I’m going to take this absence of sort of comment as a good sign.

add layers of complication to the overall effect. And her melancholic expression suggests something now irrevocably lost. Uncle Ludwig had changed forever the way we understand religion by the time young Anselm was working on this painting, and (maybe I’m reading too much into the work) it is, in its own way, just as conscious of a sense of loss.

s we cascade thoughtlessly into the A twenty-first century, discarding large elements of the way we used to live, these paintings are strangely relevant to us.

As we cascade thoughtlessly into the twenty-first century, discarding large elements of the way we used to live, these paintings are strangely relevant to us. They too evoke times gone by and instil in us a sense of loss. That’s not a bad thing, and the fact that this inspiration comes from overseas artists should be, and so far has been, entirely irrelevant.

This is to me a surer sign of maturity or ‘coming of age’ than a belligerent chest-thumping about valuing that which is local before all else.

29 art all autumn 2011

I’ve not seen this exhibition of Mueck’s work unfortunately, but as I’ve already noted, I did see the European Masters in Wellington. Very enjoyable it was too. It had a good range of nineteenth and twentieth century European artists, chief among them being people like Cezanne, Renoir, Picasso, Courbet, Corot, although Tischbein’s Goethe in the Roman Campagna (1786-7) was used as the front-of-house work.

Those names notwithstanding, the exhibition was primarily a German affair. The artist best represented was Max Beckmann, with a dozen or so works (paintings mostly, but one sculpture as well) spanning most of his working life.

These powerful works were an historical commentary on German society in the first half of the twentieth century. As things deteriorated in his native land, so his work became grimmer, darker and more suggestive of underlying menace.

No other artist had more than three or so works exhibited, so they were more of a snapshot of that artist’s career, than a commentary. The strongest of them all, I thought, was Gustave Courbet’s Village Road in Winter (c.

1868), a brilliant example of a brilliant artist. In fact, many of the other works displayed were weaker examples of the artist in question. Caspar David Friedrich, for example, was represented by his 1835 work Mountains in the Rising Fog. Not a weak work by any means, but nowhere near the best from that artist. The same may be said of the van Gogh, the gloomy Cottage near Nuenen (1885) and Odilon Redon’s unsuccessful Christ and the Samaritan Woman (c. 1895).

A learning experience for me was to see the two paintings by Renoir. Girl Reading (1880) and, even more so, After the Luncheon (1879) have a quality about them as live paintings that has never adequately been represented in books. One so often comes across imagery that is taken from After the Luncheon in schmaltzy, biscuit-tin works that I’d not expected to be so impressed by the original.

Another work of special power for me was Half-length figure of a Roman woman in a white tunic and a red cloak (c. 1862-6) by Anselm Feuerbach. Part of the appeal was who the artist was. Anselm Feuerbach (1829-1880) was the nephew of Ludwig Feuerbach (1804-1872), the philosopher whose work The Essence of Christianity revolutionised the way we think about religion. Anselm’s work was about representing an ideal classical pose, and the culture thought to be its backdrop. But the powerfully-built, even androgynous, features of the woman he used as his model

Postcard from Seville Cold hard cash

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Last night I started to feel cold. Despite the heating and my jacket that was still on, I felt a chill. And my eyeballs hurt.

And various points on my body, soon to be my ENTIRE body.

At the end of the evening’s teaching, I tumbled into the back of a taxi and mumbled my address. Seven minutes later, still in my jacket, I was tucked under a rug on the couch, willing someone to come and wipe my face, brush my teeth, go to the loo for me and put me in bed.

You know, I never saw my mum tucked up sick on the couch when I was little. I’m pondering this because a small person who, after creating a mess in every room she had entered, found a hard object and began to bang it on all hard surfaces mercilessly, before finding an empty yogurt container from the plastic recycling bin (how the hell did she get in there?) and running her yogurty little sausage fingers all over the table top while singing her favourite made up song which goes like this: Bula-bula, bula-bula, bula-bula, bula-bulaaaa.

Her Grandmother was born in Suva, but that has nothing to do with it.

I groan and get up to deal with it all. I had been planning to write a proposal for CNZ funding this week as part of a tight schedule mapped out for a show next year. I had held out few hopes for it being successful, and now my hopes have faded even more with the state of my aching head. My exhibition partner, believing themselves jinxed when it comes to CNZ, wants nothing to do with it. I am less superstitious and more realistic. There are lots of artists out there with lots of proposals that are far sexier.

Ain’t nothing sexy about me this morning. I lie back on the couch and think I need to get off again and clean that child, or I could ignore her, be a bad mother and continue to feel sorry for my sickly self and my artistic lot. The latter I think. Hmm, settle in, now where were we? Ah yes, talking about money, money, money – what we artists do a lot of.

I am getting cynical. The newspaper was reporting this week on an artist whose work, showing in the Reina Sofia Museum, was a strong criticism of Capitalism. Boo Capitalism! I read cynically between the lines that the artist was also seen rubbing his hands happily at his success and wondering about the commissions, sales to important collections and increased investment value that would be following. Hooray Capitalism!

That said, not every young swag gets to show their work in the museum patronised by our own dear Queen Sophie

‘Little Monkey’.

– a lovely lady. I hear the Royal Family are quite Socialist, which is an interesting idea. One they can ponder this summer while on their yacht, which is getting a little shabby apparently and wants replacing. To which the Spanish people wearily oblige. They’re quite fond of them really.

They did facilitate Spanish democracy after all. And ones representative Familia Real can’t be seen out and about in the Mediterranean on some second hand bucket. Where’s the national pride?

Enough. Right, I WILL clean that child – she is looking grubby, in that Dickens-snotty-nosed-kid kind of way (please sir, I want some more). And I WILL get on to that funding proposal, despite having theorised myself into a metaphysical corner about art making and my art making in particular. Way too much reading, too little art making.

Though I will say, I was happy to get my new boards the other day, and was sanding down the stucco I had applied

Sharp Frames 31 art all autumn 2011

on them to a smooth chalky finish. Ohhhh, I get excited just writing about it, I’ve drawn and painted on those boards a thousand times already in my head, that white surface is so tantalising – theoretical misgivings about arts practice aside.

Unfortunately, a part of my brain pinched while I admired my boards in their chalky white glory. The Presbyterian part I think, or my Methodist grandfather – God rest his soul, observing from the other side, hands in the pockets of his high belted trousers, ‘Now that’s a big heavy board, how much is that shipping going to set you back?’

Crickey dick Granddad, hand me those CNZ funding forms.

Actually my grandfather would never have handed me any Creative New Zealand funding forms, he would have poo-pooed the whole scheme, declaring that a hard rainy days work on the farm is what all those bloody over-educated idiots needed, and that I needed to roll up me shirt sleeves and not depend on anyone else. Then he would have probably have said what are you making pictures for anyway?

Bloody waste of time.

But that’s another story. Meanwhile, I still make a meagre living and need to get work home. So I must court the money, sex it all up. Gotta give it a go.

It’s time for more cold and flu drugs I think. Clara is still singing her song, wobbling her head along. So I join in from my sad state on the couch and we sing together: Bula-bula! Bula-bula! Bula-bula! Bula-bulaaaa!

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