In praise of invention, forward thinking and liberty

Freedom Farmers: New Zealand Artists Growing Ideas is currently showing at the Auckland Art Toi o Tamaki. Curated by Natasha Conland and featuring commissioned works by 20 artists, including Martin Basher and Richard Maloy, the show traces the way New Zealand artists are using ideas of utopia, sustainability and artistic freedom in their work. You can read a review of the show here.
Image Martin Basher's Untitled (Spiritual-Marketplace), installation view at the Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tamaki. Photo by Jennifer French

Artists talk about their work in Freedom Farmers at the Auckland Art Gallery

Martin Basher and Richard Maloy were commissioned to produce new works for Natasha Conland's Freedom Farmers exhibition at the Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tamaki. The Gallery has posted video interviews of the artists talking about their works on YouTube, which can be viewed via the following links: Martin Basher on Untitled (Spiritual-Marketplace) and Richard Maloy on Tree Hut #5.
Image: Martin Basher talks about his work in Freedom Farmers

Natasha Conland on Freedom Farmers

Exhibition curator Natasha Conland talks about Freedom Farmers: New Zealand Artists Growing Ideas at the Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tamaki. View video.

20 Freedom Farmers at the Auckland Art Gallery

Freedom Farmers: New Zealand Artists Growing Ideas opens tonight at the Auckland Art Gallery. Curated by Natasha Conland, the exhibition features commissioned artworks by 20 artists (including Martin Basher and Richard Maloy) tracing the way New Zealand artists are using ideas of utopia, sustainability and artistic freedom in their work.

Natasha Conland on the 4th Auckland Triennial

Curator Natasha Conland discusses the 4th Auckland Triennial Last Ride in a Hot Air Balloon here.

Last ride in a hot air balloon

Last night the Auckland Art Gallery announced the theme and lineup of artists selected for the 4th Auckland Triennial curated by Natasha Conland. The exhibition, scheduled for 12 March - 20 June 2010, will once again be spread over several venues including the NEW Gallery (Auckland Art Gallery), St Paul St (AUT University) Artspace and the George Fraser Gallery (Auckland University School of Fine Arts). 

Located towards the end of the recent global economic recession, the 2010 Auckland Triennial explores the ongoing possibilities for risk and adventure in art. The exhibition uses the thematic territory of adventure as a cue to examine the capacity art has still to be broadly explorative of form, mind, body and vision, and does so alongside the traditional mode of geographic exploration with its hints of colonialism.

Throughout modernity's global expansion, and in recent market driven democracies, adventure has held a particular association with risk. Despite the collapse of the modern era, risk taking is still regarded as a necessary strategy for those in pursuit of the rewards born by adventure and exploration. For instance, in the economic practice of 'venture capitalism', 'adventure tourism', and 'survivor' style popular television dramas, risk-taking is broadly speaking, assumed as a necessary component of achieving personal and financial growth.

The theme of the Triennial investigates adventure and risk as productive tools in their own right within the field of art. However in so doing it moves beyond modernity's taste for expansion and at the moment of global economic contraction, to leave us with adventure and risk suspended as possibility. 

The artists exhibiting in the Triennial are: Nick Austin (New Zealand), Richard Bell (Australia), Martin Boyce (Scotland) Shahab Fotouhi (Iran/Germany), Shilpa Gupta (India), Marine Hugonnier (France/United Kingdom), Laresa Kosloff (Australia), Jorge Macchi (Argentina), Tom Nicholson (Australia), Philippe Parreno (France), Bundith Phunsombatlert (Thailand), Walid Sadek (Lebanon), Michael Stevenson (New Zealand), Bo Zheng (China/Hong Kong), Mahmoud Bakshi (Iran), Johanna Billing (Sweden), Gerard Byrne (Ireland), Alicia Frankovich (New Zealand), Robert Hood (New Zealand), Shigeyuki Kihara (Samoa/New Zealand), Learning Site, Alex Monteith (New Zealand), Mike Parr (Australia), Garret Phelan (Ireland), Olivia Plender (United Kingdom), Tino Sehgal (United Kingdom/Germany), and Tove Storch (Denmark).

Exhibition details from the 4th Auckland Triennial information pack.