Ocula Conversation Hito Steyerl: How To Build a Sustainable Art World 'A Picture of War is Not War', we read in Hito Steyerl's iconic film November (2004), an essayistic Super 8 film tackling the definition of terrorism constructed around the figure of the artist's best friend Andrea Wolf, who was killed as a terrorist in 1998 in Eastern Anatolia after she joined the PKK (Kurdistan Workers' Party). Mixing documentary...
Ocula Report Aichi to Okayama: Art in Japan Looks to the Future 11 Oct 2019 : Stephanie Bailey for Ocula There has been a flurry of triennial and biennial art activity in Japan this year. The Aichi Triennale opened in Nagoya this August, sparking a national debate about the shutting down of a display of formerly censored works—the result of public backlash against a burnt image of Emperor Hirohito and a statue commemorating the women forced into...
Ocula Insight | Video Hans Hartung and Art Informel at Mazzoleni London (1 October 2019-18 January 2020) presents key works by the French-German painter while highlighting his connection with artists active in Paris during the 50s and 60s. In this video, writer and historian Alan Montgomery discusses Hartung's practice and its legacy.Born in Leipzig in 1904, Hans...
Bartley + Company Art sells and promotes high-quality, critically-relevant artwork in all media by emerging and established contemporary New Zealand artists. The gallery is located within the heart of Wellington’s gallery district — the Cuba Art Quarter.
Ocula Report Melbourne Art Fair: ‘finding its political and global footing’ 9 Aug 2018 : Carol Que for Ocula The fifteenth edition of the biennial Melbourne Art Fair (MAF) (2–5 August 2018), which returned after skipping its 2016 edition, was understated in its ground-level presentation. Forty participating galleries from across Australia, with the exception of eight spaces from New Zealand (including Two Rooms, Michael Lett and Bartley + Company Art) and...
Ocula Conversation Ann Shelton Artist, New Zealand Through a wide range of photographic investigations, Wellington-based artist Ann Shelton has, over her 20-year career, explored the construction of narratives that surround social, political and historical contexts. A selection of Shelton's prolific practice has been brought together in her review exhibition, Dark Matter, at Auckland Art Gallery...
Ocula Conversation Judy Millar Artist, New Zealand New Zealand artist Judy Millar has long been concerned with art’s relationship to the phenomenal and sensorial world. Her ambitious works test both the limitations and possibilities of traditional painting and sculpture. More than simply referencing art history, Millar’s captivating paintings and ‘space works’ invite the...
Ocula Conversation Julia Morison Artist, New Zealand Two thousand and fifteen marks the 40th anniversary of New Zealand artist Julia Morison’s first exhibition. Morison studied graphic design at Wellington Polytechnic in 1970-2 and painting at the University of Canterbury in 1973-5. After showing a number of severely formalist paintings she took a break from exhibiting: from this came two...
Related Press STUDIO INVESTIGATIONS | A DAY IN THE LIFE OF PAINTER JUDY MILLAR Verve Magazine : 13 October 2018 Having just had the Guardian list her latest UK show at Fold Gallery as one of the top five in London, Judy Millar is undoubtedly one of New Zealand's most successful international painters. Her work is part of Australasia's compendium of contemporary painters and is scattered throughout museums, galleries and private collections worldwide.
Related Press Three Judy Millar Paintings EyeContact : 19 April 2018 'Gesture' and 'gestural' are vastly overused words in talking about abstract painting but remain unavoidable in talking about Judy Millar's work. As Kundera intimates above, perhaps gestures perform us, rather than the other way around, memes proliferating like living things. Perhaps art is merely a long war to determine who is in charge.
Related Press Judy Millar: The Sinew of Space Contemporary HUM : 12 February 2018 It's frustrating to her, Judy Millar tells me from the West Coast of Auckland as we discuss her exhibition in Zurich, Swallowed in Space, that people are so rarely asking 'what does painting do to us?' [1] . An affective painting, after all, is something we want to go and see, and revisit, and make part of our wider experience. I wholeheartedly...
Related Press Artist's New Year honour: 'We don’t value the arts highly enough' Stuff : 30 December 2017 Julia Morison didn't need to give much thought to whether or not to accept her latest accolade. The Christchurch artist has been made an Officer of the New Zealand Order of Merit in the New Year Honours, arguably the highest recognition of a 40-year career.'Anything that promotes the arts is a really good thing,' she said.'We have so much but we...
