“Would a discursive shift from environmentalism to vital materialism enhance the prospects for a more sustainability-oriented public? … If environmentalists are selves who live on earth, vital materialists are selves who live as earth, who are more alert to the capacities and limitations…of the various materials they are.” (Jane Bennett, 2010: 111)
> Bright Cave takes place on whenua belonging to Kāi Tahu, Waitaha, and Kāti Mamoe iwi.
>You are an online (offline) corporeal bundle reading this data on a screen.
>You are an offline (online) corporeal bundle holding this page of oil and tree cellulose in the gallery.
> Bright Cave contains clay, Papatūānuku, wool, readymades, dye, textiles, paint, flowers, monitors, words, handmade paper, karakia, time, games, anxiety, kawakawa, captured rain, GIFs, sound, distress symbols, recycled materials, code, queerness, and friendship.
> Bright Cave is an exhibition about the materiality of art making in a time of socio-ecological crisis. The assembled works make a play between disembodiment and tactility, but ultimately resist a neat IRL/URL distinction in favour of an “earth-based” continuum. In some respects Bright Cave is asking what it means to make work about socio-ecological crisis (the earth, biodiverse species – including humans) with the very materials of the earth.
>The para-curatorial events—through films, talks and presentations— are intended to draw out the materiality of the Internet (e-waste, server farms, subterranean cables, “The Cloud”), the materiality of digital art practices and digital dissemination of art works, to highlight socio-ecological issues that are at once localised and globalised, and to counterpoint “crisis” with “remediation.”
>Repurposing Jane Bennett’s proposition above, Bright Cave asks: what does it mean to live as earth, to live with the awareness that we are earth?
Anthony Antonellis (MFA, 2011, Bauhaus-Universität, Germany) lives and works on the Internet from New York. Recent exhibitions include the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, 2016; 3rd Shenzhen Independent Animation Biennale, China, 2016; Artecámara Gallery, Colombia, 2016; DAM Gallery, Berlin, 2015. He is Visiting Assistant Professor of Art+Design at Purchase College, New York.
Hana Pera Aoake (Ngāti Raukawa, Tainui) is a writer and artist trapped in Te Whanangui-a-tara, Aotearoa. They are currently drowning in debt they will never be able to repay completing an MFA at Te Kunenga ki Pūrehuroa (Massey University). Hana works primarily within the Māori art collective, Fresh and Fruity with Mya Morrison-Middleton (Ngāi Tahu). Recent projects include, Heartache Festival organised with Ali Burns in Te Whanangnui-a-tara, 2018; Pirate Bay residency , WORM Gallery, Rotterdam, NL, 2018; Whats love got to do with it? Love, labour and contemporary art organised by All Conferences at First Draft Gallery, Sydney, 2018; Murky Waters with Fresh and Fruity, curated by Charlotte Parallel and Aroha Novak, Art & Activism symposium, Otago University, Ōtepoti, 2017.
Emma Fitts (MFA, 2010, Glasgow School of Art, Scotland) is the current artist-in-residence at McCahon House, Titirangi Auckland. Recent projects include I digress , with Victor & Hester, Enjoy Public Art Gallery, Wellington, 2017; Homeshow , Christchurch, 2017; Section, Elevation, Perspective , Parlour Projects, Hastings, 2017; From Pressure to Vibration: The Event of a Thread , The Dowse, Wellington, 2017; Necessary Distraction: A Painting Show , Auckland Art Gallery, 2015-2016. Emma returned to New Zealand in 2014 to take up the Olivia Spencer Bower Foundation Award.
Miranda Parkes’ (MFA, 2005, Ilam, Christchurch) practice includes painting, large-scale installation, video, and work in public space. Recent exhibitions include (Un)conditional I , The Physics Room, 2018; the merrier , Hocken, Dunedin, 2017; Pocket Star , State of Princes, Dunedin, 2015; Stargazer , Yuill/Crowley, Sydney, 2015. Parkes’ work is held in public collections throughout New Zealand, and in private collections in New Zealand, Australia, the U.K and U.S.A. Parkes was the Frances Hodgkins Fellow, 2016; Olivia Spencer Bower Foundation Art Awardee, 2013; Tylee Cottage Fellow, Whanganui, 2009, and the William Hodges Fellow, Southland, 2007.
Maddy Plimmer (BFA, 2015 Massey University, Wellington) is a studio artist at MEANWHILE Gallery, Wellington, and a resident artist of the JPEG2000 Collective. Recent exhibitions include Hive Mind , The Engine Room, Wellington, 2018; Flowers , Window Gallery, Auckland, 2018; Caressing the Silver Rectangle , Enjoy Public Art Gallery, Wellington, 2017; The Tomorrow People , Adam Art Gallery, 2017.
Robyn Maree Pickens is a writer, curator, and PhD candidate in ecological aesthetics at the University of Otago, Ōtepoti. Her writing has appeared ANZJA, Rain Taxi, Jacket 2, Art + Australia Online, takahē, Turbine|Kapohau, The Pantograph Punch, Queen Mob’s Teahouse, Art New Zealand and Art News. Currently she is an art reviewer for the Otago Daily Times, Art News, and The Pantograph Punch, and was Blue Oyster Project Space’s 2016 summer writer-in-residence on Quarantine Island Kamau Taurua.
Sorawit Songsataya (MFA, 2014, Elam, Auckland) is a Thai-born artist who lives and works in Tāmaki Makaurau (Auckland). Songsataya was the recent artist-in-residence at McCahon House in Titirangi, Auckland. Currently he is participating in the Swedish Arts Grants Committee's International Studio Programme (IASPIS) in Stockholm. His recent exhibitions include: Soon Enough: Art in Action , Tensta Konsthall, Stockholm, 2018; Starling , Artspace, Auckland, 2018; Cabinets of Curiosities , Papakura Art Gallery, Auckland, 2017; Acting Out , Adam Art Gallery, Wellington, 2017; Dark Objects , The Dowse Art Museum, Wellington, 2017; Potentially Yours: The Coming Community , Artspace, Auckland, 2016; The Non-living Agent , Te Tuhi Centre for the Arts, Auckland, 2016.
Anthony Antonellis, Hana Pera Aoake, Emma Fitts, Miranda Parkes, Maddy Plimmer, Sorawit Songsataya
<Bright Cave>
Curated by Robyn Maree Pickens
Wednesday 16 May – Saturday 9 June 2018
Please join us on Wednesday 30 May from 5:30pm for Film screening | Bright Cave: Lights Dimmed: a selection of short documentaries on ecological issues.
