Mindfood go behind the scenes at the Gallery

If any of you have picked up the latest edition of Mindfood Magazine you will have seen the fabulous photo shoot they did on the Gallery's development site. Photographing our Director Chris Saines, Dame Jenny Gibbs, Project Manager for the development site Grant Thomas, Architect Richard Francis-Jones, Curator Natasha Conland and Artists Ava Seymour and Shigeyuki Kihara. 

As well as the photos, which you can see in the magazine, they also did a great behind-the-scenes video of the whole thing which you can see here. It looks like it was a lot of fun!

Laurence Aberhart at Selma

Some photographs reach straight into one's heart. Laurence Aberhart’s black and white contact print of Flag and Bridge, Selma, Alabama 15 September 1988 is such a song.
Although made by a New Zealand artist, this is photograph brims with the history of modern America. One cannot look at this bridge and its reflection beneath the billowing flag and not be stunned by the image's symbolism. This bridge marks an awareness of African American civil rights from an international viewpoint.

On 7 March 1965, a day that would later became notorious as Bloody Sunday, armed state and local police officers attacked the 600 marchers trying to cross the bridge at Selma. They were there on a protest mission, to walk to Montgomery, the state capitol of Alabama.
This march was initiated by James Bevel and it registers a moment of change within the history American civil rights. Alabama had an appalling history of the non-provision of voting rights to its black citizens. Only 2% of the African American population were registered as voters even though they numbered over 50% of the state’s population.

The Library of Congress’s account of the day notes that the marchers were “demonstrating for African American voting rights and to commemorate the death of Jimmie Lee Jackson, shot three weeks earlier by a state trooper while trying to protect his mother at a civil rights demonstration. On the outskirts of Selma, after they crossed the Edmund Pettus Bridge, the marchers, in plain sight of photographers and journalists, were brutally assaulted by heavily armed state troopers and deputies.” (http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/today/mar07.html)



Caption: Unknown photographer
The third civil rights march from Selma to Montgomery, Alabama 21 March 1965
Front row from left: John Lewis, an unidentified nun; Reverend Ralph Abernathy; Reverend Dr Martin Luther King Jr.; Ralph Bunche (Undersecretary of the United Nations); Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel; Reverend Fred Shuttlesworth.
Photograph courtesy:
http://www.dartmouth.edu/~religion/faculty/heschel-photos.html

Using clubs and tear gas the police prevented the marchers from crossing the bridge. They returned on 9 March led by the Reverend Dr Martin Luther King Jr and were again repelled. After five days walking, starting on 21 March 1965, 3200 people finally succeeded in getting to Montgomery, 87 kilometres away. By the time they arrived in the capital the march had increased to 25,000 people. The distinguished Hasidic scholar Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel later wrote of his close involvement with these protests, "When I marched in Selma, my feet were praying."On 26 February 2010, I telephoned Laurence Aberhart and asked if he would write an account of the circumstances of his making this important photograph at Selma. His reply is fascinating and I publish it in full here, knowing that it is an important account about the making of one of his key image.

New Zealand photography does not need to be 'of' New Zealand to be part of our culture's history. Laurence wrote:
"When I travel I often make a deliberate and conscious attempt to be in the location where a past great photographer once worked. Paris, in the locales that Atget once photographed. New Orleans and Louisiana haunted by Clarence John Laughlin. Vicksburg, Natchez, Mississippi and Selma, Alabama, where Walker Evans found his great Farm Security Administration material.
In 1988, I was lucky enough to be granted a Fulbright travel award to photograph in the southern states of the USA. There, I was often guided to the same places that Walker Evans photographed, often simply because he had worked there. So, in Alabama it was automatic to go to Selma. I was looking there for the buildings that Evans photographed, to witness the changes that time makes .

I was stuck by the symmetry of the bridge and it's reflection in the river. Remembering my other photographs of bridges [Alexandra, Otago] I thought that it would make a good subject. Looking around and knowing that Americans are so flag conscious and that I was in a 'significant' place - because of its import to the American civil rights movement - I noticed the flag on the porch of a nearby riverbank house.
I thought I could be clever and try and incorporate the two in one image. This required me to ask the owner of the house, luckily at home, if I could set my camera and tripod up on his porch to take the photograph. Permission was granted and the owner stood around watching. At some point I pulled my head out from under the dark cloth to hear the owner say to me something like

'Oh course you know that that's a famous bridge.'
[Me] 'Famous?'
'Well some would say Infamous. You know, where all that crap started from.'

It dawned on me that this was the Edmond Pettus Bridge that Martin Luther King and the civil rights march fought over in 1965. Dr King organised a civil rights march to gather in Selma to march to Alabama's capitol, Montgomery, to try and bring about voting rights for black people in the state.

The local police gathered on the far side of the bridge on the edge of the town and the route to Montgomery and on the day of the planned march, fought on the bridge with the protesters and turned them back. A few days later the protesters gathered in greater numbers, fought a pitched battle with the police again on the bridge and this time they were victorious and marched on to Alabama.

The attention that the march and the battle on the bridge gained caused more and more protesters to join the march so that they were so strong in number by the time they reached Montgomery. The decision was made to carry on the Washington DC, where, by the time they reached, the group was so large that they turned Alabama's refusal to permit black enfranchisement around. In fact, the resistance to civil rights for black Americans to vote was turned around. The battle on for the William Pettus Bridge was the turning point for America's civil rights struggle.

Back on the porch, taking the photograph, apart from wondering what the redneck Southerner was thinking as to what I was up to, my great concern was for my safety - there was, the whole time I was taking the photograph an increasingly irritated and in volume, increasingly higher pitched buzzing coming from a tiny iridescent blue humming bird, hovering just a few feet away from me, on station, guarding his nest in a hole in the riverbank very close by. I came away unscathed from both.

Caption:
Laurence Aberhart
Flag and Bridge, Selma, Alabama, 15 September 1988 1989
gelatin silver print
Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tamaki, purchased 1989

CC put the lights on

The Lantern Festival starts in Auckland's Albert Part tonight, always a fantastic event in the city. Cut Collective, having realised their Public Access show at our Art Lounge was happening at the same time as the Lantern Festival, have got in on the act by creating some amazing lanterns that are now hanging from the canopy outside the Art Lounge.

They are pretty amazing and really brighten up Khartoum place, so if you are heading into Albert Park tonight, take a walk through Khartoum Place on your way there for a peak at the Cut Collective lanterns.

Here are some photos of the lanterns going up.

The lanterns ready and waiting to go up

Showing some of the artwork on the lanterns

Scaffolding to put the lanterns up

.....and they are up!

Time to head in for a cuppa

I couldn't resist adding a couple of photos from along the way. Remember Cut Collective's Public Access show is only on until 11 March and someone from Cut Collective is usually around each day if you want to have a chat with them.

Four of the six from Cut Collective pose (with great ease I might add) for a media opportunity
|

To give you a rough idea of what to expect inside the Art Lounge - there is much more though so well worth a visit of course.

Ans Westra's New Zealanders

Ans Westra has spent a lifetime recording New Zealanders and she has produced some remarkable images of how we look. They are records of both a time and place that look directly at life's intimate moments. This is one of the benefits to her documentary approach - it asks us to look at what we are seeing.

Her photographs convey human personality in a telling manner. You feel how closely she is looking at movement and gesture, as if they make up our physical signature. She shows how people are living their lives. These two young guys take delight in presenting their timber town haka to Ans' camera. The modesty of this image is really a measure of its charm. It's a simple moment of the artist communicating her pleasure in meeting these boys on a Murupara street and just stopping to record them. What is stunning about this photograph is that while it was made with a medium format camera - never an easy tool to use - it has been made quickly and with stunning confidence.

I really like the way this man cuts hair. No nonsense at a job that has to be done. The boy has the same attitude. The smoker could probably shear sheep just as confidently. Ans is physically close to the people she photographs and the framing, while it may appear casual, is always perfect for the shot. The focus is short so that while the background can be seen it is carefully kept a bit out of focus to concentrate on the presence of the figures.

The Gallery is fortunate in having 59 black and white photographs by Ans Westra in the collection. The first group was acquired in 1976 and the most recent ones in 1997. Looking at the entire collection again, I was struck at how consistent Ans has been in the ways in which she records people. All of the photographs are of people living in New Zealand and none of the images has been set up. There is never any sense that Ans has been searching for the ‘decisive moment’ which Henri Cartier-Bresson was such an effective advocate for with his own documentary photography.

There is a powerful tenderness in Ans' eye. This girl is not in any way scared of the photographer but she is wary. There is a tentativeness in her response to the woman she sees holding a big camera while looking down into a viewfinder rather than directly at her. This is a quiet inner city street at Wellington where children still play. Marti Friedlander, similarly, also took fine images of children using the street near their homes as a playground.

One of the strengths of Ans’ photography is her strong empathy with people. One hardly ever encounters famous or celebrity people in her photographs, she prefers to look at ordinary citizens. Her ability to represent the experience of young people from their own perspective is compelling. The event of the photograph, its simple taking, never becomes a big event for her subjects and that is why people come across as natural and unforced.




You cannot look at this photograph and not think that it is a picture taken during school holidays. Heat and water, sand and sun. Ans does not often choose such action shots. Yet, with swimming and water, the scene almost calls for a true moment of fun when flying through the air. It reminds me of this question - when did you last fly through the air and land on hot sand?

Credits: Ans Westra

Murupara 1984

gelatin silver print

From the series: Whaiora - The Search for Life

1997/27/15

Holloway Road, Wellington 1973

gelatin silver print

1985/5/8

Hikurangi 1982, printed 1984

gelatin silver print

From the series: Whaiora - The Search for Life

1997/27/17

Otara, Auckland 1984

gelatin silver print

1997/27/12

Te Kao, North Cape 1983

gelatin silver print

1997/27/16

Cut Collective inside and out

I went down to the Gallery to see how it was going with the Cut Collective installation and was amazed that they have started painting the outside of the Art Lounge already.

I'm no Peter Jackson, however, I did take a little bit of video footage so you could see what was going on (don't laugh at the shaky camera hand).

I'd really recommend any of you in the neighbourhood, to get on down to Lorne Street and see what they are up to. They will be back on site tomorrow (weather permitting) and it's pretty mesmerizing to watch them as they paint.

Otherwise don't forget that the inside of the Art Lounge is also open to the public from the 20 February to 11 March. There's loads going on in there, which I will save for another day.

Enjoy!

Cut Collective - Day 1

Yesterday was the first day of installation for the Cut Collective crew. I went down and had a look as I was so excited to see what they were doing. It looks fab! The Art Lounge looks like a whole new space. A wall has been built to cover the seating area and provide more space for the work. There were loads of stencils, cans of spray paint in a multitude of colours, ladders and drop-cloths strewn around the room. Some stencil work has already been done to cover the inside walls, and they look great. The colours and shapes are amazing.

Cut Collective are installing part of the work until the 20th February. Then we hope you will come down and see them in action, as they continue to work on the inside and outside walls of the Art Lounge. Well I will stop gushing and just let you look at some of the photos I took.

Hold on, that's not a member of Cut Collective, thats our front of house manager - trying to sneak into the group i think! Richard, you're not fooling anyone by holding up a stencil.

I'll be back on Monday to let you know how they are getting on.

Cut Collective arrive...

Cut Collective, a fabulous collaborative group of 6 artists, are currently transforming our Art Lounge as part of their 4th annual Public Access show.

They arrived today and began work in the Art Lounge which will be open to the public from Saturday 20 February when you can head down to watch as they continue to work.

As a sneaky peek, here are a few photos of them preparing in their studio. Just to tease you with a taste of things to come.

Cut Collective - Public Access 4
20 February to 11 March
Outside 24/7
Inside 10am to 5pm
Auckland Art Gallery, Art Lounge
Free

John McGarrigle and the American Photographic Company

One of the most intriguing photographers to work in Auckland during the 19th century was the talented and enigmatic John McGarrigle. He promoted his business as the American Photographic Company (Do not confuse this with the photo studio of the same name that operated in Dunedin). McGarrigle created many exceptional carte de visite portraits of Maori. I have always thought that they were less formal and more natural than the engaging cartes made in the 1870s by Auckland's Pulman and Co. If we only knew more information about McGarrigle's studio!

The National Library’s Time frames states that McGarrigle’s studio flourished from the 1870s to the 1890s but this date range is not correct. The precise dates of his Auckland operation have not yet been discovered but they are certainly early in the practice of local photography. I know that he was active from the mid-1860s to March 1874, when he closed his business.

The American Photographic Company was a small operation. John McGarrigle seems to have both owned the business and taken all the portraits himself. His approach always respects his sitters and they are well lit from the skylight above. The sitters either look directly at the camera or just slightly to the side. They seem totally engaged with the portrait's event. Only a plain backdrop is used and the portraits are frequently close-ups, either straight head and shoulders or shown seated at half-length. His lens is precisely focused on the face and the sitters remain utterly still. Not easy in such a long exposure.

John McGarrigle created some of the best early photographic portraits of Maori. Some sitters wear street clothes, others are costumed for this special occasion. It seems that the photographer had no preference for either traditional Maori costume or European clothing. I never sense that he fabricated his sitter's appearances although, of course, he had the usual 'library' of costume props around his studio. Every photographer of this period kept clothes for clients to wear. Although, when McGarrigle uses such a costume 'set-up' to make portraits, it is always simple. Such a direct approach shows why this portrait of a Maori youth is a stand-out image by the American Photographic Company.

The Gallery purchased this portrait in 2003. It seemed kosher at first - a rare carte de visite made by the Burton Brothers (2003/28). Yet, I was never convinced that it fitted with the Burton's studio style, it is too simplified, too essentialised in its detail.

The Burton Brothers name is printed right there at bottom left but I can now confirm that this portrait was not taken by either Alfred Burton (1834-1914) or Walter Burton (1836-1880).

Their firm issued this carte de visite but they did not make the image. I am certain that John McGarrigle made the wet collodion glass negative in his studio at the corner of Queen Street and Wellesley Street East. (I am writing this blog only 200 metres away). It dates from sometime between 1865 and 1874. Consequently, this portrait belongs with the first period of New Zealand's carte de visite portraiture.

In 1878, four years after he closed down, John McGarrigle sold his American Photographic Studio’s glass negatives firstly to Hayes and Mandeno of 194 Queen Street. They then on-sold them to Dunedin’s Burton Brothers. The Burton's were selling albumen prints taken from the glass carte negatives by 1880. Interestingly, this carte de visite is actually one of the Burton Brother's scarcest photographs. I have not traced another print of it.

No vintage print made by McGarrigle is currently recorded as being held in any public collection and no other vintage image produced by the Burton Brothers is catalogued as being in the public domain.

When exhibiting this portrait in the exhibition Flaunt during 2003 we noted - ‘Cartes de visite earned their name because they were the same size as calling cards, and were sometimes used for that purpose. It was not uncommon for photographers to persuade Maori sitters to display taniko (embroidery) borders from the hem on a korowai (cloak) draped around their shoulders for aesthetic reasons. However, the combination of traditional hair feathers, a tiara and a ‘roman toga’ over one shoulder makes this particular image highly unusual within the genre. Although no doubt supposed to be a romanticised depiction, when juxtaposed with the young man’s expression a sense of unease is created in the contemporary viewer.’ (Flaunt, 2003).

Here is an scan of the photograph and you can see that there are illuminating differences between McGarrigle's wet plate negative now owned by Te Papa Tongarewa Museum of New Zealand and Auckland Art Gallery’s carte de visite. The negative has a more extensive tonal range – the top lit from the skylight is even more apparent. The Gallery’s sepia carte de visite is much softer in tonal range with all highlights being less distinguishable.

This portrait is entirely set up. The figure is obviously not a boy but a young teenager. He is not dressed in anything like 1860s street wear. Ngahiraka Mason, the Gallery's Indigenous Curator Maori, and I both believe that the careful haircut indicates the likelihood that he attends a Church of England Mission School. His tiara is a surprising addition that, to me, makes clear allusions to Roman portrait sculpture where ceremonial laurel wreaths were worn to indicate a significant public achievement.

One never encounters contemporaneous portraits of European teenagers at Auckland waering such material. I noted here that a characteristic of McGarrigle's portrait style is his penchant for producing three-quarter views towards his sitters. He concentrates his focus point on a person's eyes and uses a narrow focal length to gives his portraits their immediacy and intimacy. Few portrait photographers working here made more memorable studio portraits at that time as John McGarrigle. Only the earlier portrait work of Hartley Webster and Dr John Kinder bears comparison.

I am grateful to John Sullivan, Curator of the Photographic Archive at the Alexander Turnbull Library of the National Library of New Zealand and Athol McCredie, Curator of Photography at Te Papa Tongarewa Museum of New Zealand for their assistance with my research for this entry.

The Te Papa image credit for this negative currently reads:
Maori boy
Burton Brothers
1869-1876
Te Papa Tongarewa Museum of New Zealand

I wonder whether they might consider changing it to read:
Maori youth
John McGarrigle, American Photographic Company
1865 -1874
Te Papa Tongarewa Museum of New Zealand
All the best for Waitangi Day 2010.

One Hundred Photographs

I have not contributed a book review here before and it may appear odd to begin doing so by discussing a book that is just about a decade old. Yet, to me, this is a book which has not dated. In fact, it feels like a more substantial book after eight years of reading it.

One Hundred Photographs – a collection by Bruce Bernard (Phaidon Press, London 2002) is a heterogeneous gathering. What publisher in New Zealand would consider issuing such a personal assemblage of photographs? The book's concept is simple - present a selection of photographs sampled from a remarkable private collection that Bernard was invited to establish by a collector in 1996. This is a tough collection full of flavour and relish. It is not driven by either the fame, or name, of any particular photographer but by an obsessive commitment to the power of images. Bernard says ‘I wanted to include every kind of photograph that truly stimulated and satisfied me, and that it seemed could permanently continue to do so.’

In his commentary to this book, Mark Haworth-Booth, a much-respected Curator of Photography, notes ‘Now his eye embraced, with equal enthusiasm, the diversity of photography – the rare, the classic, the offbeat.’

August Sander

Mardi Gras Distortion circa 1931

gelatin silver print

My first surprise was encountering August Sander’s atypical image of the Mardi Gras Distortion from about 1931. It is utterly different from his usual sharp focus photography, with its dead centre symmetrical style of seeing, for which Sander is justifiably famous. He had an eye for what Germans then called die Neue Sachlichkeit ('the new reasonableness' or, perhaps, even more accurately, 'the new objectivity'). In type, this photo is much more comparable to the experimental Bauhaus photography of the brilliant T. Lux Feininger (one of my all time faves). By distorting this print upon the enlarger's base, he creates an utterly woozy image. A sinister, funny and seductive snapshot that was never to be repeated by August Sander.

I reckon Bruce Bernard was England’s most incisive post WWII picture editor. We have never had an equivalent to him in Australasia. His innovative work for the Sunday Times Magazine totally altered the contents and appearance of international colour news supplements. His 1981 book Photo discovery is a classic of photographic research and it has helped redefine how early travel photography is regarded. Bernard had a talent for opposing the contemporary with the historical in a manner that made both photographic periods utterly beguiling. He contrasted the familiar with the unfamiliar, and commissioned innovative new work from photographers.

E. O. Hoppe

Vaslav Nijinsky of the Ballets Russes in Le Spectre de la Rose circa 1911

Photogravure

Most everyone who knows about the history of ballet rates Vaslav Nijinsky not only as a brilliant performer but as one of the most spectacularly talented dancers of the 20th century. Yet, it often hard for us to understand why he was idolised as no moving images of him remain. No film of him seems ever to have ever been shot. (The material you are told is of Nijinsky dancing on YouTube is faked up from Baron De Meyer’s justifiably renowned stills). E. O. Hoppé’s studio portrait of Nijinsky in his costume for the dance Le Spectre de la Rose is one of the most beautiful photographs of the dancer. One can easily see that he is someone who not only has the stamina of a strong athlete, he is also able to show himself to be as delicate as a flower - as if he is the rose's own fragile scent. That combination of being tough but showing tender comes together in this image. The silhouette that Nijinsky creates for the occasion of Hoppe’s portrait is absolutely gender-bending. The 20 year old man reveals himself as a 'rose' of extreme physical elegance. Nijinsky is both expanding and contracting within the one pose. Dance historian and Nijinsky biographer Richard Buckle wrote ‘No one who saw Nijinsky dance the role of the Rose ever forgot it.’

Weegee (Arthur Fellig)

The Duke and Duchess of Windsor at the Circus circa 1945

gelatin silver print

There are 12 Weegee photographs in one New Zealand public collection (Te Papa Museum of New Zealand). They were acquired by Luit Bieringa when he was Director of the National Art Gallery. Weegee was the moniker of Arthur Fellig (1899-1968) and he made the use hand-held flash one of his specialities. He liked to catch people off guard, frequently in dark and shadowed places. He was also one of the first photo-voyeurs. Weegee made his income from getting the shots that no one else wanted to take. Proto-paparazzi style.

One does not think of mid-century British royalty as ever letting their hair down amongst the masses. Here is a shot that would never, ever, have been published in Britain. Strangely, it is one of the most flattering photographs ever made of the Duke and Duchess of Windsor. They are completely relaxed and appear humanly real. For someone who was born to be King Edward VIII, the Duke is actually shown as having the time of his life. Yet, recording pleasure was not a favourite subject for Weegee. He preferred profiling trails of clotted blood. It helped that he had a radio in his car tuned into the Police channel. He always wanted to be the first at any crime-scene.

Keeping the Gallery ticking

When I arrive at the home of horologist Michael Cryns a strange new world opens up as ticking, cuckooing and chiming emanates from every wall and corner within his Henderson based home. Arms wave and pendulums swing as Michael welcomes me in to explain his history with clocks and his specific interest in our Auckland Art Gallery clock.

Tell me how you came to be a horologist (clockmaker/repairer)?

I started out with a degree in mechanical engineering, working on power stations for the electricity department. Later on, due to some health issues, I had to give it up. Then, while I was taking it easy, a friend of my parents, who was a watchmaker and repairer, asked me to help him out. I enjoyed it a lot and was very grateful to him for teaching me as much as he did. He did an apprenticeship in Holland and passed on some great knowledge on clocks. Then after finishing the work he had for me, I put an advert in a paper as a Clock Repairer and got a good response. Including an antique dealer who gave me work for a year – really good work. That’s how it all started. Around this time I read all the books in the Auckland library about clocks and still study and soak up any book on horology that turns up.

How did you come to maintain the Auckland Art Gallery clock? One day, around 21 years ago, I was in the city and I heard the Gallery’s clock chiming incorrectly. A couple of bells were not working out of the 5. I thought that wasn’t very good and rang up the council. I found someone interested who asked me to go and take a look at the clock. I reported on a fallen ladder that was jamming the bell linkages. Then, they asked me to repair it, which I did and from then on I have been involved in looking after the clock. In the past, the electricians who worked in the Art Gallery would call me if anything went wrong.

What other clocks do you work on in the city? I also work on the Town Hall clock and work on the Ponsonby clock with a clock colleague. All the clocks are from a similar period, 1890 to 1910. However, the Gallery clock is the only one made in New Zealand.

So, tell me more about the history of the Gallery’s clock? The clock was made in Wellington New Zealand in 1894 by a company called Littlejohn & Sons. William Littlejohn was born in Scotland and learnt clock making before emigrating to New Zealand in 1879 accompanied by his son Alexander Ironside. They made many of the turret clocks for the country's Post Office towers. The bells of the clock were not made in New Zealand, as this was a very specialised job, so they came from Loughborough in England.

Have you been working on the clock during the gallery development? Yes, and there is more maintenance and upgrade work to do, but in the meantime I didn’t want the clock to run mechanically with all the building work going on and the dirt and dust as it can damage the moving parts. Instead, just before Christmas, I fitted a temporary electric drive to keep the clock running, but without chimes. Also, I have been requesting some upgrades to the clock peripherals, which have been agreed to in the lead up to the opening of the new building which is great. The clock is of real historical significance. There are not many of its type and age, made in New Zealand, left. Apart from the electrically-driven winding, it is all original. I want to make sure it gets the profile and care it needs.

You are surrounded by clocks every day, but do you have a favourite? Yes that one over there, the one with no hands. It's an old German made clock that I am working on at the moment. The maker is Winterhalder and Hoffmier and it’s from around 1890, a solid mantle clock.

And finally, what’s your favourite thing about looking after clocks? My favourite thing about working with clocks is the mechanical element. Anything mechanical absolutely fascinates me. I get to work on mechanical things and get paid for it!