Joe Sheehan is a Te Whanganui-a-Tara based-jeweller and stone carver, whose practice explores the material language of stone, bringing together contemporary perceptions of the relevance and position of stone as this object or container of memory, viewing stone as not inert but as having this lively material value. 

In his current solo exhibition at Tim Melville Gallery, Line Drawing, Sheehan presents a new body of work, extending his stone carving sculptural practice. Within the works, Sheehan plays with this tension between the hard and soft, letting stone, as this firm material, hold the shape of these delicate gestures and moments of introspection or underappreciated beauty. Here, a map on the gallery floor is not a geographical navigation tool, but an offering of philosophical guidance; a cartography of memory. Gates to heaven are not an act of barrier, but a self-constructed limitation or boundary for a transition to something else, something greater, or larger than our present.

Inviting viewers into the exhibition, the space feels like this quiet offering of reflection, where fleeting moments are captured in the permanence of stone, and images of restraint become entry points of resistance – drawing lines from each work, to the viewer, and back into work; letting these conversations emerge. 

Sof had a kōrero with Joe Sheehan about Line Drawing and his overall practice.