Wednesday 2 May 2018 8:43pm
One of the items on display as part of the latest Hocken exhibition - Ruth Buchanan's Or, a screen, 2015, video still, HD 1080p24, 16:9, colour, no sound, 16' 33”, courtesy of the artist and Hopkinson Mossman, Auckland/Wellington.
The idea of libraries being a scaled-down version of the universe is just one facet of the evolution of knowledge being explored in the latest art exhibition opening at Hocken Collections, Uare Taoka o Hākena this week.
Curator of Art, Pictorial Collections, Andrea Bell says The Order of Things considers systems of categorisation, taxonomy and the production of knowledge.
Referencing twentieth century French philosopher Michel Foucault’s 1966 text by the same name, the exhibition seeks out expanded approaches to the concept of knowledge as a cultural, social and theoretical construct.
Presented within the context of the Hocken Collections, it offers a reflexive approach to research and education, museology, mātauranga Māori, and digital technologies.
"I hope it will encourage visitors to consider the socially and culturally diverse ways in which we produce, acquire and share knowledge - historically and in the present."
Ranging from the pre-colonial era to the information age, the exhibition considers cultural guardianship, the role of collecting, exhibition making, and the library as a microcosm of the universe.
“The Hocken Collections is a repository of knowledge. This exhibition reflects on the importance of collecting cultural institutions, and the systems of order that are used as a means to make sense of the world we live in.
“I hope it will encourage visitors to consider the socially and culturally diverse ways in which we produce, acquire and share knowledge - historically and in the present,” Ms Bell says.
There are more than 30 pieces in the exhibition, including artworks, archives, publications and photographs from the Hocken Collections, as well as items loaned directly from artists and private collectors.
“In The Order of Things, historic and archival materials are presented alongside contemporary and digital artworks to demonstrate the ways in which the visual language of ‘knowledge’ continues to evolve,” she says.
Alongside works by Nick Austin, Simon Denny, Richard Killeen, Alex Monteith, Ann Shelton, and Shannon Te Ao, Ms Bell is particularly excited to have pieces by Tim Wagg and Ruth Buchanan as part of the exhibition.
Wagg’s large scale two-channel video installation Cold Storage looks at the relocation of the National Digital Heritage Archive from the basement of the National Library of New Zealand to a private infrastructure provider in Upper Hutt. Filmed across both locations, the camera journeys through the vaults, revealing the immense physical reality of the hardware and resources required to store data on “the cloud”.
Buchanan’s Intractable (2011) uses language to explore the library as a metaphor for the mind. Rules such as “no touching”, “no finger licking”, sourced from Hocken Library signage, are repeated as if a script or poem. In Or, a screen (2015), her body is used as an editing tool, moving in and out of the frame and interrupting the flow of the information, as read on a microfilm screen.
Check it out:
The Order of Things
5 May to 16 Jun 2018
Hocken Collections, Uare Taoka o Hākena, 90 Anzac Ave, Dunedin
The exhibition will be open Mon to Sat, 10am to 5pm