The arts Dame

"The New Gallery project was inspired by a conversation with a friend in the United States. I said to her, 'Auckland really needs a contemporary art space, I'd love to be able to help with that. I'll do something in my will.' She said, 'Darlin', don't wait till then - do it now, when you can see it and enjoy it.' "
Jenny Gibbs, who was made a Dame Companion of the New Zealand Order of Merit for services to the arts today, describes how Auckland got its New Gallery in the NZ Herald

QEII

It's probably easier to look on the back of a coin if you've forgotten what she looks like but here, for everyone else, a selection of portraits.
Images from top to bottom, left to right. Andy Warhol, Sir William Dargie, Lucian Freud, Annie Leibovitz, Time magazine cover from 1959, Rolf Harris, George Condo and Joackim Onyangeo Nedalo.

Bird’s eye view

Feels like ages since we last featured animal art (painting flies don’t count) on OTN but you can still check out posts (one) (two) (three). Today we’re looking at bird photographers from the 1950s. This pigeon, who operated out of Germany, shot only black and white and specialised in aerial work.

Pass it on

With exhibitions coming up for Seraphine Pick and etal. in Christchurch and Japan’s Yayoi Kusama in Wellington, you might think it’s the year of the woman artist here in New Zealand, but consider the Pompidou in Paris. They have just announced that they are filling their entire permanent collection galleries with works by women. Yes, the men are off to storage. The curator Camille Morineau says, “It’s a risk.” 500 works by 200 women. An OTN cap for the first museum director to do it in New Zealand.

Dalu Mncube 1983-2009

From a Tinks03 Tweet we learnt the sad news that it was Dalu Mncube, the senior cat handler at Zion Wildlife Gardens who worked on Javier Tellez’s One Day Sculpture Intermission at Everybody’s Theatre in Opunake, who was mauled and killed by a white tiger in Whangarei.
Image: Dalu Mncube at work on Intermission

Creative

The Minister of the Arts has just confirmed that CNZ is primarily a performing arts organisation. It is probably time for the directors of the public art museums and other leaders in the visual arts community to take action. The visual arts have been sidelined.

$10.5 million extra support for the arts

Key artistic and cultural organisations get a boost of $10.5 million over the next four years in Budget 2009, Arts Minister Christopher Finlayson says.

This funding for Creative New Zealand and the Royal New Zealand Ballet will protect New Zealand’s cultural assets during the economic downturn.

Creative New Zealand will receive an additional $7.1 million over the next four years. The extra money will support key music, dance and theatre companies so they can continue to provide New Zealanders with cultural and performing arts experiences.

“The Government is providing extra funding to protect national organisations - not only for their own benefit, but because they also play an integral part in supporting regional arts organisations.”

The Royal New Zealand Ballet will receive an extra $3.4 million over the next four years, Mr Finlayson said.

“This funding for the Royal New Zealand Ballet and Creative New Zealand will have positive flow-on effects for regional arts organisations such as the Auckland Philharmonic Orchestra, the Vector Wellington Orchestra and the Christchurch Symphony Orchestra.

“The current economic situation is putting pressure on sponsorship and donations given to arts organisations. “This additional funding will relieve some of that pressure,” Mr Finlayson says.
Image: Nero

On the road

On the road is an ongoing series celebrating the Ministry of Land Transport and Local Body support of New Zealand artists.
For others in the series search 'on the road' in the blog search box above.

By the numbers

1 The number of days left in the One Day Sculpture series.

1 The number of Michael Parekowhai guitars on offer at the Auckland Art Fair.

2 The number of celebration dinners arranged by the Witte de With in Rotterdam honouring Billy Apple’s solo exhibition there.

5 The number of artists represented by Sydney dealer Roslyn Oxley who have had major exhibitions at the Wellington City Gallery over the last five years.

7.2 The percentage of funds allocated by CNZ to the Visual Arts in its Recurrent Funding of arts institutions.

10 The number of times the word ‘contemporary’ appears on the Govett-Brewster Art Gallery’s home page.

41 The average age of artists who have represented New Zealand at the Venice Biennale.

90 The number of exhibition catalogues published between 1954 and 1969 now available on the Auckland Art Gallery site.

120 The number of works slated for inclusion in Seraphine Pick’s survey exhibition opening 23 July at the Christchurch Art Gallery.

136 The number of students who graduated from the Elam School of Fine Arts in 2008.

50,000 The number of dollars Tourism New Zealand has spent creating a New Zealand reading room at the Venice Biennale

150,000 The approximate number of visitors Te Papa has reported to the exhibition Monet and the Impressionists.

A while back, when the Guggenheim Museum was being restored, we jokingly suggested a colour range they might like to consider. So how about this red Guggenheim proposal from Frank Lloyd Wright's papers recently displayed in New York.

The protection problem

In 1978 Richard Killeen came up with a stand-out idea. In recent paintings he had been using the toss of a dice to determine the kind of imagery and where it would be placed on the canvas. Taking this introduction of the arbitrary a step further, he cut shapes out of metal and pinned them to the wall. The resulting cut-outs came with instructions like “hang in a group in any order” and questioned the neutrality of the white cube. If white walls make silhouettes out of paintings, as indeed they do, why not hang silhouettes in the first place? The frameless, oddly grouped, seldom random arrangements were a surprise and a delight. When asked if people could hang them badly Killeen would answer, in his way, “Some people hang paintings upside-down. What’s the difference?” The cut-outs did have one issue: their delicate surfaces. Painted with alkyd, a resin-based lacquer, they are easily scratched and finger-marked. Which brings us to the protection problem.

Many art museums have a troubled relationship with contemporary art, fuelled by their efforts to popularise and encourage young audiences. Understanding the point at which protecting a work of art compromises the artist’s intention is a real tension.

A good example is the current display of Richard Killeen’s cut-out Black insects, red primitives at Pataka in Porirua. The work is included as part of an exhibition called I see red thanks to twelve red shapes that are interspersed with its seven black insects. As you’ve probably guessed, this is a kid’s show. To protect the work the elements have been hung within a square shape and a sheet of Perspex placed over them. Black insects, red primitives has essentially been framed.

So here’s the question. Given that Killeen cut-outs are partly a critique of the frame, should cut-outs like Black insects, red primitives be displayed in a way that is so at odds with the spirit of the work? Protective coverings, stanchions, alarms and guards all come with a price. In the case of Black insects, red primitives, that price is too high.
Image: Left, a shaped painting by Gretchen Albrecht gets the pinned-perspex treatment. Right, a portrait of Nathaniel Webb by an unknown artists and Richard Killeen's Red primitives, black insects at Christchurch Art Gallery's exhibition I see red on show at Pataka.

Wish you were here

The CNZ Venice blog is definitely worth a look with good pics and stories around installing the work.
Image: Installing Judy Millar's work at La Chiesa della Maddalena

Look alike: stupid division

Dean Martin, Jerry Lewis and Bob Hope.
Thanks P (how many times can we say it)

The Tissot Identity

You can imagine our surprise when searching around the FBI art theft site (if only they had RSS) to discover the Auckland Art Gallery featured in the recovery section. There, in the bowels of the FBI, is the story of the theft of James Tissot’s Still on top in 1998. Described by the FBI as a “dramatic heist” they go on to detail the event with Ludlam-like breathlessness. “Armed with a SAWED-OFF-SHOTGUN and a crowbar! a career criminal BURST through the main doors of the gallery. He KNOCKED a security guard to the floor, tore the painting from its frame, and ran!!!! to a waiting motorcycle with the SIX-MILLION!! dollar painting UNDER HIS ARM.” (italics, exclamation marks and capitalisation are ours).

For those wanting the happy ending, the FBI continues, “A ransom demand was made from the thief for the return of the painting, but it was recovered eight days later in Waikaretu, New Zealand. The painting was badly damaged during the theft and a two-year restoration project was needed to repair the damage.” Given the image of the Tissot on the FBI page it was a miracle anyone found it at all. You can see an unscrambled version of the work here.
Image: Tissot’s Still on top as featured on FBI Art Theft.

Things you hoped you'd never see

Utopia artist Gloria Petyarr’s Bush Medicine Leaf Dreaming for Hermes
Image: Hermes scarf

Art movies

The Art Heist is a steal-the-painting action movie. So when it starts with four figures paragliding into the grounds of the Museum of National Art of Catalonia in Barcelona, you know you’re in for the usual diet of abseiling, red laser security systems and paintings cut out of frames. The basic story of Art Heist is of the steal original , copy original, burn copy, give original to evil collector variety. The plan would surely have succeeded if it were not for one of the cops who happened to be played by a Baldwin brother (William – it’s low budget).

The copy of evil collector’s El Greco’s Christ Carrying the Cross was created by Arts of Fairies Inc. who also mocked up all the paintings on view in the movie museum. As you can see, the Arts of Fairies version of El Greco would only pass muster with a drunk monkey in the low lighting of a watercolour gallery, but it fools the art expert in the movie, so there you go. In fact the fake theme is also in play in the Museum of National Art of Catalonia’s grand looking digs. They were in fact which built in 1929 for the Barcelona Exhibition.

Back in a parallel reality, the most recent private owner of the El Greco’s Christ Carrying the Cross was Robert Lehman, founder of Lehman Brothers Investment Bank. The painting is now in the Metropolitan Museum in New York, and you already know what happened to Lehman Brothers.
Images: From top left, left to right. The set-up - pinching the El Greco, one of our paintings is missing, and another, and another (this time with gratuitous nude included), found it! and the MNAC where the whole caper starts.