95bFM: Artbank

Interpreting nature's forms is the theme of the week, as Theo is joined in studio by two artists with work showing off Karangahape Road at the moment. First up is Sena Park, who has woven a web of debris and netting with her RM exhibition, Aliveness_Symbiosis_on K-rd. Later in the show Jimmy Solórzano came along to talk about Echoes of the Coromandel, a four channel installation (with guitar) at the Audio Foundation. We also heard some banging tunes, and had a brief art guide to round up the show.   

Tom catches up with the artists Jennifer Gillam and Eugene Hanson, and they talk about their reserch into the Te Ana Ru at Whatipu. There used to be a kauri dance floor in there, at the turn of the century. They have been digging, both metaphorically and sort of physically, to find out more. Their show opens at Te Uru on Saturday. We also talked to Ngahiraka Mason, on the landline from MIQ! She is back in Aotearoa to curate Te Tuhi's newest show, "A Very Different World".  We talk about what Covid means for curating and working together with one another. Also in the show, Tom whips out the hot glue gun and tries some Vanetines day crafting. 

Heidi talks to Huriana Koopeke Te Aho about their large-scale work 'Tuuhonotanga' on the Ellen Melville centre. Huriana's work operates in a context of activism around various issues of social justice as well as affirming ways to consider knowledge, and we discuss their journey in finding the integration of Takataapuitanga with Te Ao Maaori. Next Imogen Taylor takes a call to talk about 'Thirsty Work' at Michael Lett. We discuss future directions and the divides between framing a painterly practice and accessing the less tangible operations that it works with. Theo interviews Ivan Lupi about the durational workshop at The Audio Foundation, 'Not as Simple as it sounds', in which they bring up scales of time in addressing trauma. 

This week Finn McCahon-Jones joined Theo in studio and they spoke to Louise Menzies about her exhibition In an orange my mother was eating, which runs until February 14 at the Wallace Arts Centre. Later on, Theo talked to Uma Tuffnell about Jonald Dudd, an exhibition at Christchurch's Hot Lunch gallery.

This week we spoke to Salene from @long_distancebooks, an instagram bookseller of obscure curiosities, based between London and Tāmaki Makaurau. Later on we caught up with Virginia Auton, who has collaborated with Nat Kai Emmet Miller on the exhibition Sharing Things with Friends, at Satchi & Satchi & Satchi gallery. As always, we played some excellent tunes and slightly flubbed the Art Guide. 

This week we spoke to Sam Walsh from Strange Goods and Dead Bird Books, and also celebrated the five year anniversary of David Bowie's passing (as well as his final album, Blackstar). 

This week, Taarati Taiaroa spoke with us about Toi Tū Toi Ora: Contemporary Māori Art, the largest exhibition in Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tāmaki's 132 year history. Taarati, assistant curator of Māori art at AAG, discussed the exhibition's development and conceptual propositions. Later on we had a conversation with Natasha Ratuva and Hōhua Ropate Kurene about Inside the wave are ocean bodies, their exhibition on Tautai Contemporary Pacific Arts Trust's Moana Wall. 

This week we spoke to avant-garde composer and multi-media artist William Basinski about his new record Lamentations, and the collaborative project Sparkle Division. Later in the show we caught up with local artist Emily Parr, who spoke with us about the eminent defunding of AUT's ST PAUL Street Gallery.

This week we talk to Amal Samaha about the response to the Mercy Pictures exhibition People of Colour. Samaha recently wrote an article about the same subject for the Spinoff and calls for artists move on from sheer provocation and start saying something worthwhile. We also speak with artist Tanya Edwards, who is on the line from Tonga. We hear a bit about what she has been up to since the borders shut, amd the show "Koloa: Fafine, ‘Aati, Mo e Tekinolosia / Women, Art, and Technology" which opened at Artspace yesterday. 

Today's uiui are connected by themes of somewhat precarious artistic process, as well as varous notions of 'waste'. First Isabella Loudon talks about her show Wastelands, curated by James Tapsell-Kururangi - who is also present to discuss the work. How an artist arrives at the highly original materiality of Isabella's work is a mystery to Heidi, and so an interrogation begins. James actually is cutting it pretty fine catching a flight to Pooneke by oblidging this interview, and so we have to save discussion of his practice for another interview!