Studio Mumbai (Bijoy Jain)

Luke Willis Thompson

Venue

Architectural plans with notes for the removal and acquisition of garage doors from Mahia Road, Manurewa

Born 1988, Auckland
Lives and works in Auckland, New Zealand

Luke Willis Thompson’s art deals with sites and objects that embody a sense of historical, political or social trauma. In recent work the artist has used ready-made objects – such as a local funeral home’s art collection and a house in the Auckland suburb of Epsom – to trace the faultlines of race and class in his chosen context. Thompson sets up estranging encounters where the viewer is confronted with an object both ontologically and in the space of narrative and mythology.

Selected exhibitions (solo):

inthisholeonthisislandwhereiam, Hopkinson Cundy, Auckland, 2012; Yaw, RM, Auckland, 2011. Selected exhibitions (group): Between memory and trace, Te Tuhi Centre for the Arts, Pakuranga, 2012; In Spite of Ourselves: Approaching Documentary, St Paul St Gallery, Auckland and The Dowse Art Museum, Lower Hutt, 2012; Make\Shift: Tautai’s Third Tertiary Show, St Paul St Gallery, Auckland, 2010.

‘... objects that shatter any achievable fantasy of community...’

Danny Butt, writer and artist, Melbourne

Untitled

2012

Auckland Art Gallery

three garage doors, security lights
dimensions variable
courtesy of the artist and Hopkinson Cundy, Auckland

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

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

Cinthia Marcelle

Venue

Automóvel (Automobile) 2012 (still)

Born 1974, Belo Horizonte, Brazil
Lives and works in Belo Horizonte, Brazil

Cinthia Marcelle’s video and photography deals with interventions in urban spaces or landscapes and frequently incorporates carefully choreographed, repetitive actions and elements of chaos. These works contain a sense of irony, where the absurd is presented with the appearance of certainty. Paradox is one of the concepts most linked to the performance method used by the artist, along with photography and video.

Marcelle’s videos are often shot from one camera angle and depict actions that appear to be happenstances but which become aesthetic occurrences. Her actions create situations that challenge our notions of conventional behaviour by introducing humorous coincidences and connections.

Selected exhibitions (solo):

Zona Temporária, Centro Cultural Banco do Brasil, Rio de Janeiro, 2013; See for been seen, Pinchuk Art Center, Kiev, 2011; This Same World Over, Foyer Gallery, Camberwell College of Arts, London, 2009; Bolsa Pampulha: Cinthia Marcelle, Museu de Arte da Pampulha, Belo Horizonte, 2004. Selected exhibitions (group): Sharjah Biennial 11, Arabic Emirates, 2013; 2nd New Museum Triennial, New York, 2012; Tate Level 2 Gallery, London, 2012; Dundee Contemporary Art, 2012; 29th São Paulo Biennial, 2010; 9th Lyon Biennale, 2007; 9th Havana Biennial, 2006.

‘Marcelle seems to be making a call to a different kind of mobility... that not only looks forward, but also sideways and back.’

Luisa Duarte, writer and curator, Belo Horizonte

Automóvel (Automobile)

2012

Artspace

video projection
7:16min
courtesy of the artist, Galeria Vermelho, São Paulo and Sprovieri Gallery, London

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

Michael Lin

Venue

Model Home,2013

Born 1964, Tokyo, Japan  Lives and works in Shanghai, China and Brussels, Belgium and Taipei, Taiwan.

Michael Lin is best known for his large-scale colourful floral paintings which cover the facades of building, interiors, windows and furniture. Using patterns from traditional Taiwanese textiles and decorative arts Lin’s work blurs the lines between art and craft, and raises issues around the continuity of traditional and domestic art forms. These playful insertions question the role of art in public space as Lin transgresses the line between the undervalued domestic realm and the dominant public one. Lin has collaborated with architects and local trades people to create environments and structures which encourage new ways of encountering art.

Selected exhibitions (solo):

Model Home, Rockbund Art Museum, Shanghai, 2012; Michael Lin, Free Port No. 005, Peabody Essex Museum, Salem, 2012; Hotel MARCO, Museum of Contemporary Art, Vigo, 2011; A Modest Veil, Vancouver Art Gallery, 2010; Michael Lin, OK Offenes Kulturhaus, Linz, 2007; Michael Lin, Kunsthalle Wien, Vienna, 2005. Selected exhibitions (group): 3rd SingaporeBiennale, 2011; Memories of the Future, Leeum, Samsung Museum of Art, Seoul, 2010; 4th Fukuoka Asian Art Triennale, 2009; Space For Your Future, Museum of Contemporary Art, Tokyo, 2007; Notre Histoire, Palais de Tokyo, Paris, 2006; 2nd Guangzhou Triennial, 2005.

‘... Lin goes out looking for ... anonymous patterns loaded with collective memories.’

Yuko Hasegawa, Chief Curator, Museum of Contemporary Art, Tokyo

Model Home

2013

Auckland Art Gallery

For the 5th Auckland Triennial Michael Lin and Atelier Bow Wow collaborated with Professor Andrew Barrie from the University of Auckland to create a life-size paper document of worker housing element of the Model Home project, the sound and video artists were Nanli Lou and Ren Cheng. Andrew Barrie is a specialist in the Japanese technique of paper model building known as okoshi-ezu (folding drawing), and has adapted aspects of this technique for Model Home 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

Rigo 23

Venue

Just in time for too late, (2013)

Born 1966, Madeira, Portugal
Lives and works in San Francisco, United States of America

Rigo 23 is an artist interested in the different forms of community-based practice. In the 1990s he painted a number of large-scale Pop Art-inspired murals which highlight world politics and the plight of political prisoners including the "Black Panther Party" and the "Angola Three". Some of Rigo 23’s most memorable murals appear on the sides of buildings, including the large black and white mural One Tree, 1995. In this mural Rigo 23 painted the words ‘one tree’ in a giant traffic arrow which points to a lone tree in a crowded industrial setting – a reminder to the people who pass it of what is lost in urbanisation.

http://www.artistsrespond.org/artists/rigo23/

Selected exhibitions (solo):

Autonomous InterGalactic Space Program, REDCAT Gallery, Los Angeles, 2012; Tate Wikikuwa Museum: North America 2024, Warehouse Gallery, Syracuse University, 2010; The Deeper They Bury Me, the Louder My Voice Becomes, New Museum, New York City, 2009; Cracks in the Highway, MAC – Museu de Arte Conemporânea, Niterói, 2007. Selected exhibitions (group): Autonomous Regions, Times Museum, Guangzhou, 2013; Kochi-Muziris Biennale, Kerala, 2012; Fifty Years of Bay Area Art – the SECA Awards, San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, 2011; The Jerusalem Show IV, East Jerusalem/Ramallah, Palestine, 2010; 10th Lyon Biennale, 2009.

‘A social activist and commentator in his own right, Rigo 23 has an aesthetic that is unpretentious and direct.’

Nigel Borell, Kaiwhakahaere, Toi o Manukau, Auckland Council

Untitled

2013

Fresh Gallery Otara

Emory Douglas, Rigo 23, Wayne Youle
painted mural
2940 x 11300
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