Venues
Foreigners Everywhere (Chinese and French), 2013

Foreigners Everywhere (Chinese and French), 2013

Foreigners Everywhere (Chinese), 2008

Foreigners Everywhere (Chinese), 2008

Foreigners Everywhere (Tibetan), 2010

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


Venue
Under Discussion, 2005 (video still)

Under Discussion, 2005 (video still)

Returning a Sound, 2004 (video still)

Returning a Sound, 2004 (video still)

(formed 1995) Live and work Puerto Rico

Jennifer Allora
Born 1974, Philadelphia, United States of America
James Calzadilla
Born 1971, Havana, Cuba

Collaborating since 1995, Jennifer Allora and Guillermo Calzadilla have produced an experimental and interdisciplinary body of work, combining performance, sculpture, video and sound. Their Land Mark, 2001–ongoing, project focuses on what the artists describe as the ‘transitional geography’ of Vieques, an inhabited island municipality of Puerto Rico used by the U.S Navy as a weapons-testing range from 1941 to 2003.

http://www.lissongallery.com/#/artists/allora-and-calzadilla/

Interested in questions of social justice the artists set into motion a series of structural couples – inscription and erasure, presence and absence, appearance and disappearance – which link processes of mark-making with counter-memorial claims for rights and justice vis-à-vis specific sites.

Selected exhibitions (solo):

Stop, Repair, Prepare, MoMA, New York, 2010, and Haus der Kunst, Munich, 2008; Allora & Calzadilla, National Museum of Art, Oslo, 2009; Compass & How to Appear Invisible, Temporare Kunsthalle, Berlin, 2009; Never Mind That Noise you Heard, Stedekijk Museum, Amsterdam; Allora & Calzadilla, Kunsthalle Zürich, 2007; Clamor, Serpentine Gallery, London, 2007; Wake Up, The Renaissance Society, Chicago, 2007. Selected exhibition (group): 54th Venice Biennale, 2011.

Half Mast\Full Mast

2010
Auckland Art Gallery

dual-channel HD colour video projection
21:11min
courtesy of the artists and Lisson Gallery


Venue
Libellule bleue (Blue Dragonfly), 2009/2011

Libellule bleue (Blue Dragonfly), 2009/2011

Le salon (The Living Room), 2008/2011

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


Venue
Kauri-oake, 2013

Kauri-oake, 2013

Kauri-oake, 2013

Kauri-oake, 2013

Kauri-oake, 2013

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


Venue
Bishan Commune,2013

Bishan Commune,2013

Outdoor film screening, Bishan Harvestival, 2011

Outdoor film screening, Bishan Harvestival, 2011

Ou Ning: Bishan Commune: How to Start Your Own Utopia

Ou Ning: Bishan Commune: How to Start Your Own Utopia

Born 1969, Zhangjian, Guangdong, China
Lives and works in Beijing, China

Ou Ning is a graphic designer, editor, curator, filmmaker, writer and lecturer and founder of U-thèque, an independent film and video organisation. He is the founder of the Bishan Commune which brings together artists and intellectuals to get involved in the rural reconstruction movement in China. In 2011 the Commune held its first Harvest Festival in the rural settlement of Bishan. This incorporates music, dance, a small documentary festival and academic panels on rural reconstruction with local and international intellectual speakers.

http://www.alternativearchive.com/ouning/

Selected exhibitions and events:

Museu de Arte Contemporânea da Universidade de São Paulo, 2011; Videotage, Hong Kong, 2011; Tirana Biennial, 2009; Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive, 2008; Smithsonian Institution, Washington, 2008; Victoria & Albert Museum, London, 2008; Contemporary Art Centre, Vilnius, 2007; Yokohama International Media Art Festival, 2009; 22nd Milan, Asian, African and Latin American Film Festival, 2012.

‘... Ou Ning and his ‘communards’ are looking to create an alternative social entity...’

Hou Hanru, Curator, 5th Auckland Triennial

Bishan Project

2013
Auckland Art Gallery

sketchbooks, drawings, magazines, archival material, photographs, video, mixed media objects
dimensions variable
courtesy of the artist


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

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


Venue
Tropical Thunder,2013

Tropical Thunder,2013

Tropical Thunder,2013

Tropical Thunder,2013

Tropical Thunder,2013

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