All posts tagged: New Zealand

Owen Dippie – ‘Te Wheturere’, For Stu

Owen Dippie – ‘Te Wheturere’, For Stu

New Zealand artist/muralist Owen Dippie has not been painting much outside lately, so it’s a pleasure to welcome him back to BSA today with a new portrait and tribute. “I painted this mural of my friend as a symbol of the infinite love between a father and his son,” Owen tells us. “This piece is also for everyone who has ever lost someone. As we look to them they look to us.”

Owen Dippie. “Te Wheturere, 2023”. New Zealand. (photo © Ash Worthlane)

The image is in the photorealist style Dippie is known for – portraits full of warmth and intention, so that they feel as if they could speak to you at any moment. We let Owen do the speaking here:

“I stretch my gaze towards the universe and watch for you my son, for every luminous celestial body that enters earth’s atmosphere is you illuminating the sky and sending me messages of hope in the falling stardust.

Owen Dippie. “Te Wheturere, 2023”. New Zealand. (photo © Ash Worthlane)


For Stu, moko in particular the Matatūhua (facial moko) has been the central tool he has used to heal from the grief and trauma of losing his son to cancer 8 years ago. While the tohu (symbols) on his moko are a reminder of his past grief and trauma; the moko also depicts his neverending love for his son and provides a map guiding him on his journey forward. Every year new lines are added or existing lines are deepened and the physical pain and spilling of blood are a healing release of the profound emotional pain held deep within the body.”

Owen Dippie. “Te Wheturere, 2023”. New Zealand. (photo © Ash Worthlane)
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Polish Pener Takes a “Vacation From Reality” in Christschurch, NZ

Polish Pener Takes a “Vacation From Reality” in Christschurch, NZ

Christschurch in New Zealand has seen a boom in street art for the last decade, which many say was sparked by the devastating earthquake that killed nearly 200 people in 2011. Rising like a creative phoenix on painted walls, street artists’ created an organic artful response – healing hearts and summoning community pride in the beauty here in Ōtautahi, the name given to this city first by the Māori.

Pener. Vacation From Reality exhibition at the Fiksate Galley in Christchurch, New Zealand. (photo courtesy of the artist)

A boom in the gallery scene quickly followed, and Jenna and Nathan Ingram opened Fiksate in 2015. The white box gallery is known primarily as a respected hub for the street art/urban contemporary art genres. They have a steadily growing roster of local and international artists, some of whom you may recognize.

Currently, they are hosting a show by the Polish artist Pener, whose saturated abstractions have evolved from his deconstructing of graffiti letterforms and his fascination with the mechanized world. Today he confesses that his forms are softening somewhat due to his maturing process and gentle way of looking at life. Part of a growing school of Polish artists creating abstract works, Pener (Bartek Swiqtecki) has become quite passionate about this non-figurative form that allows for individual interpretation.

Pener. Step Into the Light, 2022. Vacation From Reality exhibition at the Fiksate Galley in Christchurch, New Zealand. (photo courtesy of the artist)

He arrived in NZ after a 30-hour trip from Poland and worked quickly for a week to mount the exhibition “Vacation From Reality.” The show features eight large original canvasses, three limited-edition prints, and some abstractly grey shadowed walls on which to hang them.

Pener spoke of his process and headspace with local street art expert Reuben Woods, an art historian, writer, and curator. He writes a column for the website “Watch This Space” about the lively street art scene.

Pener. Brainstorm, 2022. Vacation From Reality exhibition at the Fiksate Galley in Christchurch, New Zealand. (photo courtesy of the artist)

From the interview, we share with you just one Q&A from their discussion that marks this exhibition to provide BSA readers with greater context and insight.

Reuben Woods: As an abstract artist, you have stated you start with an emotion and the process, and when I look at your work, I can’t help but feel it captures the anxiety and emotional fracture of contemporary society. Is that intentional or a result of our ability to read abstraction as we need to?
Pener: I often get the impression that the paintings are a bit like mirrors in which we can look at our emotions. My paintings calm me down and give me peace. Often, in the process of painting, I freeze in front of a painting. I look at it for so long that I stop thinking. It’s the same feeling as if you swim for a long time in the swimming pool or climb in the mountains and stop thinking about everyday problems. It takes you somewhere inside or outside.

Probably everyone has a slightly different interpretation of works of art – which is very interesting. Some people see specific shapes in them, others only feel emotions. I am very happy when someone interprets my paintings in a way that I did not know and did not notice.

Pener. Jungle of doom, 2022. Vacation From Reality exhibition at the Fiksate Galley in Christchurch, New Zealand. (photo courtesy of the artist)
Pener. Frozen Paths, 2022. Vacation From Reality exhibition at the Fiksate Galley in Christchurch, New Zealand. (photo courtesy of the artist)
Pener. Vacation From Reality exhibition at the Fiksate Galley in Christchurch, New Zealand. (photo courtesy of the artist)
Pener. Vacation From Reality exhibition at the Fiksate Galley in Christchurch, New Zealand. (photo courtesy of the artist)
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Olivia Laita, Wishes And Hopes For 2019

Olivia Laita, Wishes And Hopes For 2019

As we draw closer to the new year we’ve asked a very special guest every day to take a moment to reflect on 2018 and to tell us about one photograph that best captures the year for them. It’s a box of treats to surprise you with every day – and conjure our hopes and wishes for 2019. This is our way of sharing the sweetness of the season and of saying ‘Thank You’ to you for inspiring us throughout the year.


Today’s special guest:

Olivia Laita, Curator, Arts Manager with ONO’U Festival in Tahiti, Founder of Aotearoa Urban Arts Trust in Auckland, New Zealand


Why this photo?

This photo captures a point in current time here in Auckland, New Zealand, of a generation of Polynesians who are a product of their parents migration and resulting Pacific Diaspora. Through the power of the Internet reconnecting the people of the Moana, Polynesians are moving to the forefront to tell their own stories through their own creative platforms, rather than through anthropological-like viewpoints set by modern day colonialists.

What do you wish for 2019?

For all creative practitioners to explore and learn about their ancestral identities through the engagement of all five senses in real space, with little help from books and search engines, in hope that it may influence their work in unique ways.

Auckland, New Zealand

TITLE: Untitled, 2018

MODEL: Luciane Buchanan

CREATIVE DIRECTION: Luciane Buchanan & Brendan Kitto

LOCATION: Auckland, New Zealand

PHOTO: Brendan Kitto

 


Olivia Laita
Curator/Arts Manager – www.olivialaita.com
CEO of Aotearoa Urban Arts Trust – www.auat.co.nz

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BSA Film Friday: 05.27.16

BSA Film Friday: 05.27.16

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Our weekly focus on the moving image and art in the streets. And other oddities.

Now screening :

1. I Don’t Expect To Be A Mother, But I Don’t Expect To Die Alone: Olek and Michelle P. Dodson:
2. The Tale of Hillbelly
3. Nychos: Vienna Therapy
4. PangeaSeed’s Sea Walls: Murals For Oceans – New Zealand 2016

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BSA Special Feature: Olek and Michelle P. Dodson: I Don’t Expect To Be A Mother, But I Don’t Expect To Die Alone

A walk-through of last years’ installation in the basement of the former Williamsburg Savings Bank by Olek and Michele P. Dodson incorporating crochet and projection mapping. Organized by Santiago Rumney Guggenheim the show was a collection of some of his favorites, including Swoon, Aiko, and light artist Olivia Steele, the immersive room that Olek and Dodson created caught your attention because of its state of flux.

Light projections featured the unraveling of crochet pieces projected on walls, in frames, across of mini Judy Chicago-ish triangle shaped dinner table, and mannequins suspended from the ceiling wrapped in Olek bodysuits. The installation seemed to capture and release the viewer quickly, giving a sense of impermanence. For that matter the whole inaugural show by what was presented as a new gallery appeared to disappear quickly as well. But for that moment,  just when you are sure you were getting it and ready to move on, beauty would take over, patterns overwhelming.

So it’s good to look at this again, albeit without sound, and wonder when that thread will be picked up again.

The Tale of Hillbelly

We leave the city street to a go to the wide open country for this one.

The simplest of stories are our oldest, passed down through folklore and standing as archetypes. Here in a live/animated tale we see a vision of idealized nature and rites of spring with a real orchestra, this yoga performing hillbilly communes with nature and is overcome by it in a foxy manner. Of course it is a metaphor that may be interpreted by myriad philosophers, and we think it looks a lot like this moment.

Created by Darren Rabinovitch with a score by Jeremy Harris.

 

Nychos: Vienna Therapy.

A brief teaser of an upcoming show by Nychos in New York. He’ll be splitting Freud wide open in public at the Flatiron Plaza June 16th.

Also there’s the June 25th Jonathan Levine opening that will dissect more ICONS, and you may even see a new wall or two soon by this Austrian urban illustrator.

 

PangeaSeed’s Sea Walls: Murals For Oceans – New Zealand 2016

 “Within the span of five days, 28 large-scale, thought-provoking public murals were realized throughout the Ahuriri and Napier area. Each piece sheds light on New Zealand’s pressing marine environmental issues such as shark finning, overfishing, coastal development, climate change, and endangered marine life conservation, furthering PangeaSeed Foundation’s ARTivism (Art + Activism) initiative.”

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Owen Dippie with Tame Iti and a Revered Elder in Auckland, NZ

Owen Dippie with Tame Iti and a Revered Elder in Auckland, NZ

A new mural in Auckland pays tribute to a revered elder of the Tūhoe kuia named Hokimoana Tawa as part of a collaborative mural by Street Artist Owen Dippie and activist/artist Tame Iti. A first for the duo, this is a non-commisioned gift to the community from the two that is significantly close to the recent efforts at reconciliation between the police and the Tūhoe kuia people in this small town of Tāneatua.

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Owen Dippie and Tame Iti. Tuhoe Nation, New Zealand. November 2015. (photo © Erin Dippie)

Coming on the heels of a public apology by the police commissioner and his officers for an abuse of their power during raids of the community in 2007, the mural is hoped to be a fresh sign of healing, say the two artists.

According to Owen’s wife Erin, the couple traveled “to Ruatoki to stay with Tame and his lovely Partner Maria to create this mural ‘Ma mua a muri ka tika’ (the people of the past have things to say to the people of the future). Tame spoke with several Tūhoe woman and asked who they thought was the face of the nation and as a result, Hokimoana Tawa was chosen to adorn the wall.”

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Owen Dippie and Tame Iti. Tuhoe Nation, New Zealand. November 2015. (photo © Erin Dippie)

Owen says he and Tame have a great communication through their common language of art and that this may just be the first of a few more projects they will be doing together in the community. “It is an amazing collaboration between these two,” says Erin, “considering the history that has happened here in New Zealand between the crown & the people of Tuhoe.”

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Owen Dippie and Tame Iti. Tuhoe Nation, New Zealand. November 2015. (photo © Erin Dippie)

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Owen Dippie and Tame Iti. Tuhoe Nation, New Zealand. November 2015. (photo © Erin Dippie)

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Owen Dippie and Tame Iti. Tuhoe Nation, New Zealand. November 2015. (photo © Erin Dippie)

 

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BSA Film Friday: 04.17.15

BSA Film Friday: 04.17.15

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Our weekly focus on the moving image and art in the streets. And other oddities.

Now screening :

1. Hyrtis Animates David Bowie and “Life in Mars”
2. Jorge Rodriguez-Gerarda. “Grounded Gratitude” Paris, France.
3. Street Art in Dunedin, New Zealand

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BSA Special Feature:
Gladys Hulot, AKA Hyrtis Animates David Bowie “Life in Mars”

BSA readers will dig this animation of David Bowie’s “Life on Mars,” Gladys Hulot, also known as Hyrtis, brings Bowie to slink through the cracks and around the concrete underground, dripping with piercing drama, and plenty of distinctive style. The voice here is stunningly replaced with a musical saw, giving the chameleon just one more layer to his multiple identities.  Not precisely street art, but Bowie’s ties to the street are undisputed.

 

Jorge Rodriguez-Gerarda. “Grounded Gratitude” Paris, France.

With “Grounding Gratitude” painted at the festival In Situ Art of Aubervilliers during spring 2014, Jorge Rodriguez-Gerada paints Nicole Picquart, a social worker who helps people to have a better life.

 

Street Art in Dunedin, New Zealand

 A quick overview of the murals for Dunedin in New Zealand.

 

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BSA’s Piece on “Submerged Motherlands” Acclaimed for Year

BSA’s Piece on “Submerged Motherlands” Acclaimed for Year

BSA with Swoon at Brooklyn Museum Sited by Huff Post Editors as Proud Moment of 2014

We’re very pleased and thankful to be included in this short list chosen by the editors of Huffington Post Arts & Culture as a story they are most proud of publishing last year.

In her introduction to the list, editor Katherine Brooks writes:

“It turns out, 365 days is hard to summarize in anything but a laundry list of seemingly disparate phenomena, filled with the good — woman-centric street art, rising Detroit art scenes, spotlights on unseen American art– and the bad less than good — holiday butt plugs, punching bags by Monet, Koonsmania. But, as a New Year dawns, we found ourselves just wanting to focus on the things that made us beam with pride in 2014. So we made a list of those things, a list of the pieces we’re proud of.”

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Describing why we thought this was an important story for us we wrote:

“We loved a lot of stories this year, but this hometown Brooklyn one about a street artist with humanity mounting her first solo major museum exhibition was a special turning point — and an astounding success. For us street art is a conversation, a continuum of expression, and Swoon is always a part of it. From following her street career to her transition to international fame to witnessing this exhibition coming to fruition in person in the months leading up to the Brooklyn Museum show, it is easy to understand why Swoon still remains a crucial part of the amazing street art scene and continues to set a standard.”

-Jaime Rojo & Steven Harrington, HuffPost Arts&Culture bloggers and co-founders of Brooklyn Street Art

In fact, we wrote 48 articles that were published on the Huffington Post in 2014, and as a collection we hope they further elucidate the vast and meaningful impact that the Street Art / graffiti / urban art movement continues to have on our culture, our public space, and our arts institutions.

Together that collection of articles published by BSA on Huffpost in ’14 spanned the globe including stories from Malaysia, Poland, Spain, France, Norway, Switzerland, Germany, New York, Arizona, The Navajo Nation, Philadelphia, Sweden, Istanbul, New Jersey, Lisbon, The Gambia, Brazil, Australia, New Zealand, Rome, India, Italy, Delhi (India), Montreal, San Francisco, London, Coachella, Chicago, Kabul (Afghanistan), and Kiev (Ukraine).

Here on BSA we published another 320 postings (more or less).

We thank you for allowing us to share these inspirational and educational stories with you and we are honored to be able to continue the conversation with artists, art fans, collectors, curators, academics, gallerists, museums, and arts institutions. Our passion for Street Art and related movements is only superceded by our love for the creative spirit, and we are happy whenever we encounter it.

Our published articles on HuffPost in 2014, beginning with the most recent:

 

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