Cinthia Marcelle

Claire Fontaine

Venues

Foreigners Everywhere (Chinese and French), 2013

Foreigners Everywhere (Chinese), 2008

Foreigners Everywhere (Tibetan), 2010

(formed 2004)
Lives and works in Paris, France

Claire Fontaine is a Paris-based collective, founded in 2004. After lifting her name from a popular brand of school notebooks, Claire Fontaine declared herself a ‘readymade artist’ and began to elaborate a version of neo-conceptual art that often looks like other people’s work. Working in neon, video, sculpture, painting and text, her practice can be described as an ongoing interrogation of the political impotence and the crisis of singularity which seem to define contemporary society today.

http://www.clairefontaine.ws/

Selected exhibitions (solo):

1493, Espace 1414, San Juan, 2013; Redemptions, CCA Wattis, San Fransisco, 2013; Carelessness causes fire, Audian Gallery, Vancouver, 2012; Breakfast starts at midnight, Index, The Swedish Contemporary Art Foundation, Stockholm, 2012; M-A-C-C-H-I-N-A-Z-I-O-N-I, Museion, Bolzano, 2012; P.IG.S., MUSAC, León, 2011; Economies, Museum of Contemporary Art, Miami, 2010; After Marx April, After Mao June, Aspen Art Museum, 2009. Selected exhibitions (group): When Attitudes Became Form Become Attitudes, CCA Wattis, San Fransisco, 2013; The Deep of the Modern, Manifesta 9, Genk, Limburg 2012 Unrest: Revolt Against Reason, apexart, New York, 2012; 9th Shanghai Biennale, 2012; Re-writing Worlds (Art and Agency), 4th Moscow Biennale, 2011; 12th Istanbul Biennial, 2011.

‘Not only are there foreigners everywhere, but we are foreigners everywhere.’

Linda Tyler, Director, Gus Fisher Gallery

Foreigners Everywhere (Chinese)

2008

Auckland Art Gallery

neon, framework, transformer, cables
215 x 1300 x 50 mm

Foreigners Everywhere (French)

2011

Auckland Art Gallery

neon, framework, transformer, cables
110 x 1720 x 50 mm

Foreigners Everywhere (Korean)

2013

Auckland Art Gallery

neon, framework, transformer, cables
148 x 1535 x 50 mm

Foreigners Everywhere (Hindi)

2013

Auckland Art Gallery

neon, framework, transformer, cables
185 x 2120 x 50 mm

Foreigners Everywhere (Samoan)

2013

Auckland Art Gallery

neon, framework, transformer, cables
110 x 1240 x 50 mm

Foreigners Everywhere (Māori)

2013

Auckland Art Gallery

neon, framework, transformer, cables
130 x 2292 x 50 mm
courtesy of the artist

Foreigners Everywhere (Māori)

2013

Gus Fisher Gallery

neon, framework, transformer, cables
130 x 2292 x 50 mm
courtesy of the artist

Keg de Souza

Venue

Tropical Thunder,2013

Born 1978, Perth, Australia Lives and works Sydney, Australia

Keg de Souza is an inter-disciplinary artist who works across mediums including video, artist’s books, printmaking, inflatable architecture, installation and drawing. The investigation of spatial politics is central to de Souza’s work, as she focuses not only on the built environment but also social space. De Souza is involved in collaborative artistic projects and groups, such as the SquatSpace artist collective, the collaborative duo You Are Here, the Network of Un-Collectable Artists and the Rizzeria printmaking collective. Under the name All Thumbs Press she publishes hand-bound books and zines featuring her illustrations and writing.

http://www.allthumbspress.net/

Selected exhibitions (solo):

Gonflables et amuse-bouches, Darling Foundry, Montréal, 2012 Living Under the Stars, Urban Art Projects, Brisbane, 2012; Rosen-tales; Women’s Studio Workshop, New York, 2012; Ramble Through The Rocks, Offsite: MCA, Sydney, 2011; Whatever Floats Your Boat, Cockatoo Island Studios to Balmain, Sydney, 2010. Selected exhibitions (group): Social Networking, Gallery of Modern Art, Brisbane, 2012; Primavera 2011: Young Australian Artists, Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney, 2011; Trama, Museu de Arte Contemporânea de Serralves, Porto, 2011; Designated Drivers, The Block Museum of Contemporary Art, Evanston, Illinois, 2011; The Right to The City (SquatSpace), Tin Sheds Gallery, Sydney, 2011.

'Tropical Thunder ... investigates the commercialisation of traditional practices...’

Anna Davis, Curator, Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney

Tropical Thunder

2013

Fresh Gallery Otara

plastic tablecloths, fans, bottled soft drink, risograph printed maps dimensions variable
courtesy of the artist

Abraham Cruzvillegas

Venue

Autoconstrucción, 2009 (still)

Born 1968, Mexico City, Mexico
Lives and works in Mexico City, Mexico

Abraham Cruzvillegas’ practice is informed by growing up in Ajusco, a district of Mexico City. Cruzvillegas transforms everyday objects including pieces of scrap metal, plastic rubbish, and animal waste into art. Stark and somewhat precarious in construction, these dynamic assemblage sculptures retain a deep mystical quality. His recent work addresses solidarity, collaboration and optimism, and his construction of art using readily available materials operates as a metaphor for the articulation of individual identity and place.

Selected exhibitions (solo):

Abraham Cruzvillegas: The Autoconstrucción Suites, Walker Art Centre, Minneapolis, 2013; Abraham Cruzvillegas, Kurimanzutto, Mexico City, 2012; Abraham Cruzvillegas: Autoconstrucción: The Optimistic Failure of a Simultaneous Promise, Modern Art Oxford, 2011; The Magnificent Seven: Abraham Cruzvillegas Capp Street Project, CCA Wattis Institute Event, San Francisco, 2009; Autoconstrucción: The Soundtrack, The Centre for Contemporary Arts, Glasgow, 2008. Selected exhibitions (group): Garden of Reason, Ham House, London, 2012; 30th São Paulo Biennial, 2012; dOCUMENTA (13), Kassel, 2012; 12th Istanbul Biennial, 2011; Unmonumental, New Museum, New York, USA, 2007; 50th Venice Biennale, 2003.

Autoconstrucción

2009

Auckland Art Gallery

HD video, single-channel, colour, sound
63:00min
courtesy of the artist and kurimanzutto, Mexico City

Anri Sala

Venue

Tlatelolco Clash, 2011 (still)

3-2-1, 2011

(born 1974) Albania.
Lives and works in Berlin.

Working primarily in film and video, Anri Sala creates works that bring together documentary, history, language and cultural memory. Early films referenced his personal experience and reflected on Albania’s social and political changes, while recent works have explored the tension between repetition and improvisation, often involving or offering the possibility of live performance.

http://www.mariangoodman.com/artists/anri-sala/

Sala’s films and installations disrupt and reconfigure the viewer’s relationship to the image and the space, echoing his approach to making work, which the artist describes as being ‘shaped, inspired and constrained by rupture, and transitory or intermediate stations’.

Selected exhibitions (solo):

Museum De Pont, Tilburg, The Netherlands, 2013; Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris, France, 2012; Serpentine Gallery, London, UK, 2011; About Change Studio, Berlin, Germany, 2010; CAC Contemporary Arts Center, Cincinnati OH, 2009; Museum of Contemporary Art North Miami, USA, 2008; Extra City, Antwerp, Belgium, 2007. Selected exhibitions (group): 2012 Documenta, Kassel, Germany; 9th Gwangju Biennale, China, 2012; Architektonika, Hamburger Bahnhof, Berlin, Germany, 2012; Tribute to Anri Sala, Locarno Film Festival, Italy, 2011; 29th São Paolo Biennale, Brazil, 2010; Haunted: Contemporary Photography/Video/Performance, Guggenheim Museum, New York, 2010; Gender Check, Museum Moderner Kunst Stiftung Ludwig Wien, Vienna, Austria, 2009; The Implications of Image, Museo Universitario de Ciencias y Arte, Mexico City, Mexico, 2008; Moskau Biennale, Moscow, Russia, 2007.

‘Music, emotive and often abstract, is a powerful form of non-verbal communication, and even a catalyst for change.’

Andrew Clifford, Curator, Centre for Art Research, The University of Auckland

Long Sorrow

2005

Gus Fisher Gallery

HD video transferred from super 16mm film, stereo sound
12:57min
courtesy of Johnen Galerie Berlin; Galerie Rüdiger Schöttle, Munich; Marian Goodman Gallery, New York; Hauser & Wirth, Zurich / London; Galerie Chantal Crousel, Paris

Tlatelolco Clash

2011

Gus Fisher Gallery

HD video projection, five-channel surround sound
11:49min
courtesy of kurimanzutto, Mexico City; Marian Goodman Gallery, New York; Hauser & Wirth, Zurich / London; Galerie Chantal Crousel, Paris

3-2-1

2011

Gus Fisher Gallery

live performance featuring artist André Vida responding to the film Long Sorrow
courtesy of the artist

Do Ho Suh

Venue

A Perfect Home: The Bridge Project, 2010 (video still)

(born 1962) Seoul, South Korea
Lives and works in New York, London and Seoul.

Do-Ho Suh’s sculptures and installations explore spatial dynamics and issues of cultural difference. His site-specific installations act like microcosms of the postmodern, globalised world, questioning the boundaries of identity in relation to public and private space. Suh’s work, which draws from his Korean background and life in the West, addresses the place of individual and collective identities in a global society. Through the use of architectural elements and references to the body, Suh evokes a trans-cultural life where the dynamics of space, culture and connection create unanticipated form.

Selected exhibitions (solo):

Hiroshima MOCA, Hiroshima, Japan, 2012; Leeum Samsung Museum, Seoul, South Korea, 2012; Tate Modern, London, UK, 2011; Storefront for Art and Architecture, New York, USA, 2010; 2001 Venice Biennale, Italy. Selected exhibitions (group):Luminous: The Art of Asia, Seattle Art Museum, 2011; 2010 Liverpool Biennial, Liverpool, UK; 2010 Venice Architecture Biennale, Italy; Your Bright Future: 12 Contemporary Artists from Korea, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, USA, 2009; Psycho Buildings, Hayward Gallery London, UK, 2008.

‘... there is no freedom in architecture. In fact freedom is a ruse Suh points to...’

Yasmeen M Siddiqui, curator and essayist, Louisville, Kentucky.

A Perfect Home: The Bridge Project

2010

Auckland Art Gallery

synchronised four-monitor animated digital slide presentation, two single-channel videos, sound
11:00min
© Do Ho Suh
courtesy of the artist

Noël Burch

Venue

Aereile Jackson, Tent City, Los Angeles

Apple harvest Betuwe

Donlim factory worker, Shenzhen

Born 1932, San Francisco, United States of America

Lives and works in United States of America and Paris, France

Noël Burch has been publishing books since the 1960s and these include Theory of Film Practice (1973) and To the Distant Observer: Form and Meaning in Japanese Cinema (1979), which remains the seminal history of Japanese cinema. While he is primarily known as a writer, Burch is also a filmmaker and has directed over 20 films, most of which are documentaries. Burch is the co-founder and director of the Institut de Formation Cinèmatographique, an alternative film school connecting theory and practice.

‘Sekula and Burch’s film asks us to consider those critical spaces between the local and the global...’

Alex Davidson, Curatorial Assistant, Artspace, Auckland

The Forgotten Space

2010

The Film Archive

film essay / feature documentary, English subtitles
110:00min
producers: Frank van Reemst, Joost Verheij
co-producers: Vincent Lucassen, Ebba Sinzinger
courtesy of DOC.EYE Film

Yto Barrada

Venue

Libellule bleue (Blue Dragonfly), 2009/2011

Le salon (The Living Room), 2008/2011

Born 1971, Paris, France
Lives and works in Tangier, Morocco

Yto Barrada’s art reflects her experiences of living in Tangier, and the realities and struggles of life in a city undergoing rapid development and modernisation. Her photography captures the quiet dramas that play out when the diversity of local people and wildlife give way to the mono-cultural visions of planners and developers. Barrada’s work reveals a ramshackle kind of modernity and the existential issues of a society dominated by a desire to leave.

http://www.ytobarrada.com/

Selected exhibitions (solo):

Riffs, Deutsche Guggenheim, Berlin, 2012; The Strait Project, Witte de With, Rotterdam, 2004; Selected exhibitions (group): I Decided Not to Save the World, Tate Modern, London, 2012; Palais de Tokyo, Paris, 2012; 54th Venice Biennale, 2011; Hand Me Downs, film screening at MoMA, San Francisco, New York, 2011.

‘Barrada likens her multifaceted practice to a stack of Russian dolls, where one piece fits into another and another still.’

Kaelen Wilson-Goldie, independent writer and critic, Beirut.

Casa Barata

2001

Artspace

Artspace
c-type print
1000 x 1000 mm

Rue de la Liberté, Tanger

2000

Artspace

c-type print 1250 x 1250 mm

Tunnel – Ancien chantier d'étude de la liaison fixe Maroc-Espagne

2013

Artspace

(Tunnel – Disused Survey Site for a Morocco-Spain Tunnel), Tanger 2002
c-type print
800 x 800 mm

Briques (Bricks)

2003

Artspace

c-type print
1500 × 1500 mm

Le salon

2008

Artspace

(The Living Room)
c-type print
1500 x 1500 mm

Nuancier de roses

2008

Artspace

(Pink Color Chart)
c-type print
1250 x 1250 mm

Libellule bleue

2009

Artspace

(Blue Dragonfly)
c-type print
1250 x 1250 mm

Sidi Hssein, Beni Said, Rif

2009

Artspace

c-type print
1500 × 1500 mm

Restaurant, Villa Harris, fig. 2

2010

Artspace

c-type print
1250 x 1250 mm
courtesy of the artist and Sfeir-Semler Gallery, Hamburg

Peter Robinson

Venue

If You Were To Work Here: the Mood in the Museum, 2013

Born 1966, Ashburton
Lives and works in Auckland, New Zealand

Peter Robinson’s recent work investigates both the materiality and metaphoric potential of his chosen medium. Whether it is the massive weightless volume of polystyrene forms or the densely contracted materiality of felt, Robinson’s sculptural propositions play out various oppositions such as density and lightness, and dispersion and compression. His felt sticks reference the formalist legacies of minimalist, post-minimalist and conceptual art, conflating these iconic art-historical conventions with both traditional Māori abstraction and taonga (treasure) forms, and genetic or binary codes, to activate a contemporary recoding and recontextualisation.

Selected exhibitions (solo): Defunct Mnemonics, Peter McLeavey Gallery Wellington, 2012; Structure and Subjectivity, Sue Crockford Gallery, Auckland, 2012; Essential Security, Sutton Gallery, Melbourne 2011; Modern Standards, Sue Crockford Gallery, Auckland, 2010, Wellington, 2010; The Influence of Anxiety, The Centre for Drawing Project Space, London, 2010; Polymer Monoliths, Artspace, Sydney and Institute of Modern Art, Brisbane, 2009; Snow Ball Blind Time, Govett-Brewster Art Gallery, New Plymouth, 2008; Soft Rock Baroque, Peter McLeavey Gallery, Wellington2008; Concatenation and Dispersion, Sutton Gallery, Melbourne, 2007; ACK!, Artspace, Auckland, NZ, 2006;The Humours, Dunedin Public Art Gallery,2005

Selected exhibitions (group): All our relations, 18th Biennale of Sydney, 2012; De-Building, Christchurch Art Gallery, 2011; The Walters Prize, Auckland Art Gallery, 2008; Three Colours: Gordon Bennett and Peter Robinson, Heide Museum of Modern Art, Melbourne, 2004; Centre of Attraction, 8th Baltic Triennale of International Art, Vilnius 2002; bi-polar, 49th Venice Biennale, 2001.

‘Peter Robinson, at Auckland Museum, reminds us that Conceptual art can jolt viewers into revisiting the perceived and the accepted.’

Marcus Boroughs, Head of Public Programmes, Auckland War Memorial Museum Tamaki Paenga Hira

If You Were To Work Here: the Mood in the Museum

2013

Auckland War Memorial Museum

240 felt-covered aluminium rods
2500 x 32 mm (each), overall dimensions variable
courtesy of the artist and Hopkinson Cundy, Auckland

Yangjiang Group

Venue

The Garden of Pine – As Fierce as a Tiger II, 2010

One Cannot Break the Law Without Upholding the Law. All Laws Must Be Broken, 2013

(formed 2002) Live and work in Yangjiang, Guangdong Province, China
Zheng Guogu Born 1970, Yangjiang, Guangdong Province, China
Chen Zaiyan Born 1971, Yangchun, Guangdong Province, China
Sun Qinglin Born 1974, Yangjiang, Guangdong Province, China

Yangjiang Group was founded in 2002 by Zheng Guogu, Chen Zaiyan and Sun Qinglin in Yangjiang, China. The direction of their work is driven by Chinese classical philosophy, the traditions of Chinese calligraphy, and notions of social transformation. In the 2009 Lyon Biennale Yangjiang Group created The Pine Garden – As Fierce As a Tiger, a work which brought art, football and chance together in a traditional Chinese garden setting.

Selected exhibitions (solo):

Yangjiang Group – After Dinner Shu Fa at Cricket Pavilion, Eastside Projects, Birmingham, 2012; Garden of Pine – Also Fierce Than Tiger II, Tang Contemporary Art Centre, Beijing, 2010. Selected exhibitions (group): 10th Lyon Biennale, 2009; Sprout from White Nights, Bonniers Konsthall, Stockholm, 2008; dOCUMENTA (12), Kassel, 2007; The Second Guangzhou Triennial-BEYOND: An Extraordinary Space of Experimentation for Modernization, Guangdong Museum of Art, 2005.

‘... a place where we learn about ourselves ... in this historical moment, this society, this city and this way of life.’

Echo Janman, Public Programmes Manager, Elam School of Fine Arts, The University of Auckland

Shu Tu Tong Gui

2013

George Fraser Gallery

(Calligraphy and Scratching Leading to the Same Thing)
participatory community event, tea residue, calligraphy
courtesy of the artists and Tang Contemporary Art, Beijing

Amie Siegel

Venues

Winter, 2013 (video still)

Born 1974, Chicago, United States of America
Lives and works in New York and Cambridge, MA, United States of America

Working across film, photography, sound and video, Amie Siegel’s work uses the cinematic image to investigate social issues. Making use of stylistic devices drawn from film genres such as action, science fiction and the western, Siegel’s installations and single-screen moving image works address critical theory and popular culture.

http://amiesiegel.net/

Interested in the history and act of filmmaking, fakes and the tradition of the remake, much of Siegel’s work is based on critiquing existing films. In Berlin Remake, she re-created shots from East German films to investigate differences and how these fictional films ‘become documents of a city’. In the recent work Black Moon, Siegel reworked a film of the same name by French director Louis Malle, setting it in abandoned suburban homes in areas of the US which have the highest mortgage foreclosure rates.

Selected exhibitions and screenings (solo):

Black Moon, Arthouse – Austin Museum of Art, 2012; American Originals Now: Amie Siegel, National Gallery of Art, Washington DC, 2012; Amie Siegel, Part 1: Black Moon, Kunstmuseum Stuttgart, 2011; Modern Mondays, MoMA, New York, 2010. Selected exhibitions and screenings (group): 2011 Cannes International Film Festival; The Talent Show, Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, 2010; Auto-Kino!, Temporaäre Kunsthalle, Berlin, 2010; The Russian Linesman, Hayward Gallery, London, 2009; 2008 Whitney Biennial, Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; Forum Expanded, KW Institute for Contemporary Art, Berlin, 2006.

‘Siegel eschews ‘documentary’ as either an aesthetic language or a pretence to truth...’

Elizabeth Thomas, curator and writer, Los Angeles

Black Moon

2010

Auckland Art Gallery

super 16mm film transferred to HD video, colour, sound
20:00min  courtesy of the artist

Winter

2013

Auckland War Memorial Museum

super 16mm transferred to HD video, colour, sound, performance
The Auckland Triennial Collection, Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tamaki, purchased 2013