mounir fatmi

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

Zhou Tao

Venue

Nanshi Tou (South Stone), 2011

Born 1976, Changsha, China
Lives and works in Guangzhou, China

Zhou Tao’s work reflects on the activities and elements of everyday life. His subtle and humorous videos record interactions between people, things, and situations – touching on questions about the multiple trajectories of reality. In the performance piece Time, 2010 in New York Zhou attached a ball of string to his body as means of recording his movements throughout the day. For Zhou, the decision to use video was not a deliberate choice of artistic language or medium; instead, the operation of the camera is a way of being that blends itself with everyday life.

http://listart.mit.edu/node/509

Selected exhibitions (solo):

Zhou Tao: The Training, Kadist Art Foundation, Paris, 2013; Open Studio: Seek for Geothermal Heat, Times Museum, Guangzhou, 2012; The Man Who Plants Scenarios, Queens Nails Projects, San Francisco, 2011; Zhou Tao, Location One, New York, 2010; 1234–, MIT List Visual Arts Center, Cambridge, MA, 2009. Selected exhibitions and screenings (group): 6th Curitiba Biennial, 2011; Non-Aligned, Marina Abramovic Institute West, San Francisco, 2010; 7th Shanghai Biennale, 2008; China Power Station Part II, Astrup Fearnley Museum of Modern Art, Oslo, 2007; Accumulation-Canton Express Next Stop, Tang

‘... Zhou Tao’s practice alchemises ordinary surroundings into a theatre...’

Xiaoyu Weng, curator and writer, San Francisco

Nanshi Tou (South Stone)

2011

Auckland Art Gallery

single-channel HD video, 36 inkjet prints
25:22min, 279.4 mm x 215.9 mm (each)
courtesy of artist and Kadist Art Foundation

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

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

Angelica Mesiti

Venues

Citizens Band, 2012 (still)

Prepared Piano for Movers (Haussmann), 2012 (still)

Born 1976, Sydney, Australia
Lives and works Sydney, Australia and Paris, France

Angelica Mesiti creates performance-based videos that analyse culture in a state of transformation due to social or economic shifts. Past projects have focused on traditional music, movement languages, and storytelling. At the core of her work is an ongoing interest in the potential of performed cultural practices as expressions of the particularities and history of a given place and community.

http://www.angelicamesiti.com/

Listen to Angelica Mesiti talking at Artspace as part of the 5th Auckland Triennial.

Selected exhibitions (solo):

The Line of Lode & Death of Charlie Day, 24HR Art, Centre for Contemporary Art, Darwin, 2012; Rapture (silent anthem), Institute of Modern Art, Brisbane, 2012; The Begin-Again, C3West Project, Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney and Hurstville Council, 2011; Rapture (silent anthem), CCP, Melbourne, 2010. Selected exhibitions (group): Sharjah Biennial 11, United Arab Emirates, 2013; NEW12, ACCA, Melbourne, 2012; Kochi-Muziris Biennale, Kerala, 2012; Rencontres Internationales, Pompidou Centre, Paris, 2010; No Soul For Sale, Tate Modern, London, 2010; Les Rencontres International, Paris, Ecole Des Beaux Arts, Paris, 2008.

‘Few contemporary works evoke such beauty ...’

Jacqueline Millner, Associate Dean, Learning and Teaching, Sydney College of the Arts

Citizens Band

2012

Artspace

four-channel colour HD video installation, surround sound 21:25min, courtesy of the artist and Anna Schwartz Gallery

Prepared Piano for Movers (Haussmann)

2012

Auckland Art Gallery

single-channel colour HD video, stereo sound 6:00min, courtesy of the artist and Anna Schwartz Gallery

Makeshift

Venue

Kauri-oake, 2013

(formed 2007) Live and work in Sydney, Australia
Tessa Zettel Born 1980, Sydney, Australia
Karl Khoe Born 1980, Sydney, Australia

Artists and co-directors of Makeshift, Tessa Zettel and Karl Khoe collaborate on interdisciplinary projects that encompass live art, sculpture and installation, drawing, printmaking, writing, curating and design. As redirective practitioners, their work imagines or enacts other ways of living that are generative of sustainment, dialogue and new economies. Site-responsive and participatory, these works are shaped by provisional communities and appear as durational interventions. Such projects involve opening up spaces of dialogue or exchange (often facilitated by the presence of food), marking time to slow down and be attentive, and a revaluing of obscured cultural knowledge, stories and practices.

http://www.makeshift.com.au/

http://kaurioke.com/

Selected exhibitions (solo):

Making Time, Performance Space, Sydney, 2013; A Leaf from the Book of Cities, National Institute for Experimental Arts/City of Sydney, 2012; Make-do Garden City, 4A Centre for Contemporary Asian Art, Sydney, 2010; Colony Collapse, Firstdraft, Sydney, 2010. Selected exhibitions (group): IASKA Spaced: Art Out of Place, Fremantle Arts Centre, 2012; Primavera 2011, Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney, 2011; Sister Cities Biennial: Urbanition, San Francisco Arts Commission Gallery/Carriageworks, San Francisco/Sydney, 2011; In the Balance: Art for a Changing World, Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney, 2010.

‘... prefaces pleasure and community spirit over economic benefit.’

David Cross, Associate Professor in Fine Art, Massey University, Wellington

Kauri-oke!

2013

Fresh Gallery Otara

New Zealand kauri, karaoke machine and mixed media, folk songs
dimensions variable
courtesy of the artists

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