Main Gallery
Three Hei tiki 2003
Maker: Rangi Kipa
Materials: resin
Courtesy Ellis Whanau Collections
Blunted Vases with Loops, Wands and Daggers 1980 to 1998
Maker: Peter Hawkesby
Materials: multi-fired and salt-glazed Oripu swamp clay and Stoke on Trent porcelain
Courtesy Private Collection
Four pieces from the installation Lift 2002
Maker: Katharina Jaeger
Materials: found objects and lycra
Courtesy Private Collection
Two Bowls 1996 and 2004
Maker: Gwyn Hanssen Pigott
Materials: porcelain
Courtesy Private Collection
1925-26 New Zealand and South Seas International Exhibition Souvenir Cloth 1925
Maker: Unknown Designer/Maker
Materials: cotton
Courtesy Private Collection
Primary Mirror for a 12 Inch Cassegrain Telescope 1995 to 1998
Maker: A.A.M.Bos
Materials: plate glass
Courtesy Private Collection
Lokki 1961
Maker: Maija Isola
Materials: cotton
Courtesy of Piece Ltd
Talking About
26 October 2004 - 27 November 2004
‘Putting objects into play in the culture’ is the vision of Objectspace. Talking About is an important project in which a group of experienced ‘players’ engage objects of their choice in some serious and strong play and in doing so creates a new opportunity for critical writing, and reading, about the handmade object. What is principally on show at Talking About is the writing. In a rather neat reversal to the more usual exhibition, the objects are here to illuminate the writing rather than the writing illuminating the object. And as writing is to the fore in Talking About we encourage visitors to read as much as they look.
Talking About foregrounds the necessary and powerful role of discourse and critical thought around the production and consumption of objects. One of the unique features of the cultural/ creative sector is the moment and place of ‘reception’, that stage in the overall cultural production/consumption chain where works are received into a culture. This is the moment of ‘talking about’ where works are discussed and meanings ascribed. Critically, taking the time to ‘talk about’ strengthens a whole sector and creates new possibilities and platforms for future cultural productions.
The original concept for Talking About was developed by Damian Skinner and Moyra Elliott and from this initial discussion Talking About has taken shape. We were delighted that Damian agreed to act as curator/editor for the project and it has been a great pleasure, as the project’s coordinator, to work with him. The idea for Talking About was to ask a number of contributors to select an object, or group of related objects, and to write about them in some depth drawing in some way upon the discourses of craft and design. When we drew up a list of possible contributors we looked first at people with a track record in writing about objects, regardless of the disciplines in which they have been trained. Our thanks go to the Talking About contributors; Don Bassett, Moyra Elliott, Ngarino Ellis, Richard Fahey, Bronwyn Fletcher, Louis Le Valliant & Rigel Sorzano, Sean Mallon, Anna Miles, Cushla Parekowhai, Elizabeth Rankin and Grant Thompson who responded to the opportunity with alacrity and whose writings so richly engage and stimulate the reader in relation to the cultural, historical, social and technological dimensions of their chosen objects.
The contributions mirror the diversity of Aotearoa, and range from the anecdotal to the art historical. These essays reveal that it is impossible, and probably undesirable, to suggest that object discourse in Aotearoa has any set features, or must necessarily assume certain rhetorical or genre forms. Talking About reveals the seriousness with which many writers approach objects, and the importance that craft and design can assume when thinking through contemporary critical issues.