CIRCUIT CAST

"(HIV) doesn’t have agency, it’s not alive like we are, it’s just a piece of programming, but.. in empathising with it, I have gained a greater respect for it" - John Walter

In this podcast Mark Williams talks to John Walter, a British artist exhibiting in Aotearoa as part of the group show Queer Algorithms now on at Gus Fisher Gallery in Auckland until 2 May. Resisting labels, binaries and the need to categorise, Queer Algorithms is conceived from an intersectional viewpoint where gender fluidity and identities are understood as always multifarious and in flux. Walter discusses his work in the show which includes the video 'A Virus walks into a bar' (2018).

In this CIRCUIT Cast 2019 review we welcome Becky Hemus (Writer), Remco de Blaaij (Director, Artspace Aotearoa), Judy Darragh (artist) and Lucinda Bennett (writer). Our panellists gather to discuss the notable shows, artists, works and provocations of the Aotearoa artworld in the year past; in the moving image and every other discipline you can name.

Among the highlights celebrated are Māori Moving Image: An Open Archive, works by Natasha Matila-Smith, Sorawit Songsataya, Selina Ershadi and Ruth Buchanan's ambitious response to the Govett Brewster's 50th anniversary.

“I’m interested in what Pacific work looks like situated in a lens of popular culture” - Tanu Gago

Savage in the Garden is a new work by Tanu Gago, currently showing as part of Personal Space, CIRCUIT’s 2019 Artist Cinema Commissions, curated by Serena Bentley. Here Tanu talks to Mark Amery about a practice based on countering false narratives of Pasifika masculinity and overcoming cultural dislocation to build communities at home and internationally. Apologies for the quality of the audio for the first 4 minutes of this recording.

On the phone from Sydney Chevron Hassett talks to Mark Amery about Mauri Tū, The First Breath of Light (2019) showing as part of Home Movies, this Saturday 28 September 10am-4pm in Wellington.

The work visualises the sunrise over Te Moana Nui a Kiwi (The Pacific Ocean) at Rangitikuia, East Cape just North of Gisborne, into the lands of the Ngāti Porou. Hassett describes the video as "a continuous loop in a poetic repetition, like a series of kowhaiwhai designs scrolling the roof the wharenui, intricately expressing sacred narratives of the Ngāti Porou...The light englightens you of the past, as the warmth connects us to the past and the waves prepare you for the future."

Still from Mauri Tū, The First Breath of Light (2019) from the series The Children of Māui

"A lot of confessions we make are performative" - Serena Bentley

In this podcast Melbourne-based curator Serena Bentley talks to Mark Amery about Personal Space, CIRCUIT's 2019 programme of Artist Cinema Commissions. Personal Space features new works by Natasha Matila-Smith, Campbell Patterson, Janet Lilo, Tanu Gago and Atong Atem. Each artist was asked by Bentley to make a short film which responded to the questions 'What do we call 'home'? What are our shared values? What does home look like?'

'Personal Space' premieres 6.30pm, Friday 4 October at the Newtown Community Centre, Wellington. Free Admission.

More info: http://www.circuit.org.nz/project/personal-space-circuit-artist-cinema-commissions-2019

"There's always the question of authoring ... I like the shared space of co-production" - Alex Monteith

In this career-spanning interview with Mark Williams, Alex Monteith discusses Coastal Flows / Coastal Incursions (2019). This ongoing installation project brings together representatives of Iwi, South Island museums and researchers nationwide to revisit a collection of archaeological material from Te Mimi o Tū Te Rakiwhānoa (Fiordland coastal and marine area). Monteith also discusses the working methods behind her 2005 feature film on the Irish Troubles, Chapter and Verse, and a subsequent shift towards works based around surfing, motorcycles and military aircraft.

Image: Coastal Flows / Coastal Incursions (production still), 2014. Alex Monteith, Sportsman Cave, Tamatea (Dusky Sound). Photo: Sarah Munro

A new roundtable podcast brings together three Auckland gallery directors; Gabriela Salgado (Te Tuhi), Lisa Beauchamp (Gus Fisher) and Charlotte Huddlestone (St Paul St Gallery), to discuss recent strategies for sustainability and audience engagement. Drawing on perspectives both local and international, the panel discuss the role of University galleries within the institution, reaching out to public space, low wages for artists and hosting the odd wedding to pay the bills.

From 30 April-4 May 2019 the Auckland Art Fair expects up to 10,000 people through its doors. What's showing? Who is it for? How does an event like this represent local practice? Does that matter? Host Mark Amery sat down with co-director Stephanie Post, projects curator Francis McWhannell and artist Judy Darragh to discuss what an event like this means for contemporary New Zealand art.


artfair.co.nz/

Peter Wareing is a New Zealand artist who has spent most of the past 30 years working in the USA and now in the UK. His exhibition Suspended Agency at the Govett Brewster examines a distinctly modern condition: individual and collective numbness in the face of increasing political and economic insecurity. In this interview Wareing talks with CIRCUIT Director and the shows curator Mark Williams about Suspended Agency, an ambitious installation, shot over 3 years in Dagenham, a London suburb which which voted overwhelmingly for Brexit.

Suspended Agency runs 6 Apr — 21 Jul 2019 at the Govett Brewster Art Gallery, New Plymouth. Photo by Sam Hartnett

“the problem is with bureaucrats who are preventing us from seeing the content” - Luke Fowler

Recently in Wellington for the opening of the Adam Art Gallery installation Passages, Scottish film-maker Luke Fowler sat down with Mark Williams at City Gallery Wellington for a wide-ranging interview on filming portraits of experimental musicians, the revolutionary potential of the past, the responsibility of the spectator, the plight of millenials and bypassing gatekeepers. He begins by discussing ‘Pilgrimage from Scattered Points’ (2006), his film about the English composer Cornelius Cardew (1936-1981).

Recorded at City Gallery Wellington. Passages continues at the Adam Art Gallery until 21 April 2019.