100% Pure New Zealand
This note was left for two visiting Pacific Island scholars staying at The Guardian Trust Building, 105 Queen Street in Central Auckland on 5 May 2009. A police report was filed in addition to a report to the New Zealand Human Rights Commission, yet the Property Manager of The Guardian Trust Building was reluctant or unable to understand the weight of what this note represents.
Don’t Pacify Me curated by Charmaine ‘Ilaiu
More about the exhibition on Spasifik magazine website
“Young, Gifted & Samoan” by Dionne Fonoti
One Saturday 20 June, Dionne Fonoti’s short film, “Young, Gifted & Samoan” was shown at Fresh Gallery Otara to replace Janet Lilo’s artist talk for the exhibition, MyFace.
“Young, Gifted & Samoan” is a brief glimpse into the lives of three young men born and raised in the US and is the result of two years of collaborative fieldwork with Samoan youth from the San Francisco Bay Area. Dionne Fonoti was born in Auckland, raised in Samoa and Hawaii, and now lives in San Francisco. She earned a BA in cultural anthropology from the University of Hawaii at Manoa and an MA in Visual Anthropology from San Francisco State University.
Film maker Dionne Fonoti with Henry and France, Fresh Gallery Otara
Dionne’s film had much in common with Janet Lilo’s experimental documentary produced in 2006 called, Struggle of an Emcee, named after the track by the same title by Abrio featuring Soul Chef.
In 2006, Lilo undertook a project to produce a series of music videos for local hip-hop artists Abrio, Bronze Chyld and Dr Seuss. Whilst the videos were produced on a shoestring budget, Lilo was able to translate the lyrical narratives and direction of the music and artists into beautifully crafted and sophisticated videography. Struggle of an Emcee, a documentary style enquiry produced at the same time provides context and uncovers stories and relationships the artists have with the global culture of hip-hop. This body of work was selected by curator Heather Galbraith for the prestigious biannual Telecom Prospect show at Wellington’s City Gallery.
A podcast extract of the documentary is on the Telecom Prospect website here.
More photos from MyFace at Fresh Gallery Otara
MyFace – A solo exhibition by Janet Lilo
Janet Lilo presents an exploration of provocative photography that comes straight out of popular culture via the web through social networking platforms. The photographs that are amassed provide a serious reflection on the preoccupation people seem to have with editing their identity and self-representation.
Fiji artists Luisa Tora + Sangeeta Singh at Fresh Gallery Otara
FGO daily shots | Saturday 13 June
MyFace is part of the Auckland Festival of Photography
A limited edition exhibition catalogue is available for free at Fresh Gallery Otara, featuring this essay by Wellington-based writer, Tessa King.
MyFace is an exploration of visual artist Janet Lilo’s fascination with social networking sites such as Bebo, MySpace and Facebook, and in particular the way people use them as a platform for personal expression and identity in the form of self-portraiture.
Lilo looks at how users unwittingly challenge attitudes towards the photographic self-portrait. The widespread ownership of digital cameras makes self-portraiture easy, and the fact that an unflattering image can so easily be deleted and replaced with one that is more satisfactory means network-users are posting only those photos that represent exactly how they want to be seen.
The photographs that make up MyFace draw the viewer in, provoking a response of mixed fascination and embarrassment – indicative of self-portraiture photography’s new, and indeed still delicate, near-acceptance. The nature of the images causes a curious tension between public and private space, inspiring an awkward sense of voyeurism from the viewing of seemingly private photographs in a very public space.
Lilo has taken this public viewing a step further than the internet, effectively ‘stealing’ these images from the social networking sites they have been posted on and placing them in a different public space, one unhindered by the confines of that pseudo-private realm. Network-users take photos of themselves in the most private of places – in bathrooms and bedrooms where they will not be ‘seen’ – but then confound this apparent embarrassment by posting the results on the most public of forums, the internet, often with no restrictions on their privacy settings.
Taking advantage of this, Lilo takes these photos out of their original context to expose a false sense of privacy encouraged by the fact that much internet use takes place alone and at home. But once a photo is posted publicly, fellow users can do what they will with images, as Lilo has done with MyFace.
The photographs range from blatant self-portraiture with arms extended at the edge of the frame and the subject looking directly into the lens, to images expertly made to look as though they were taken by a third party. Within these styles there is the sexual, the strange, the doe-eyed cutesy, and the rather mundane, as people seek to manipulate the way in which they are seen by the world.
Tessa King
June 2009
Janet Lilo’s Pecha Kucha Night presentation, November 2008
Pecha Kucha Night #11, Manukau Edition, Aotearoa New Zealand
Courtesy of Pecha Kucha Nights Aotearoa website
Janet Lilo, Skyping from Sapporo, Japan – Thumbs up to Young, Gifted & Samoan!
June 6 – AKL PHOTO DAY
7.45am Otara sunrise
Otara Town Centre
Breakfast spot
Breakfast
Ila Patel – Best Threader in South Auckland
Marsters
Anonymouz + The Hypnotics
C’Que, Mangere Love concert, Mangere Town Centre
Anonymouz + The Hypnotics, Mangere Love concert, Mangere Town Centre
Anonymouz, Mangere Love concert, Mangere Town Centre
Mangere Town Centre
Mangere Town Centre
Nicole as Banana
Ema as Banana
AIM HI exhibition, Fresh Gallery Otara
AIM HI exhibition opening, Fresh Gallery Otara
A full-on day in south Auckland
Mangere Love!
The concert was awesome… can’t get this track out my head!
Awesome awesome!!
Currently…
PUBLIC ACCESS PACIFIC ART
Curated by Ema Tavola // Talk Week // 26-29 May 2009
What’s this all about?
I’m a postgraduate student at the School of Art and Design developing my visual arts practise in curatorship; using other peoples’ work to create collective statements about Pacific-ness. I work with Pacific artists mostly. I’m interested in Pacific art being accessible to wide audiences.
Why have I chosen these artists?
They are fierce, clever, confronting and skilled.
It’s a tasty mix of gender, power/struggle, popular culture and cleverness.
These three artists are reflective of social / political / economical / spiritual / cultural traits of Pacific people living in urban New Zealand.
Why these locations?
They’re public and somewhat relevant.
Anything else?
I work with Pacific artists mostly, because I’m interested in what contemporary Pacific art says about modern Pacific island realities. I’m interested in public feedback.
Ema Tavola
May 2009
LOCATIONS // ARTISTS
1) Creative Industries Research Institute window, 34 St Paul Street // Angela Tiatia
2) Bennett’s Bookshop window, AUT Hikuwai Plaza // Allen Vili
3) Rectangle Box, Governor Fitzroy Place // Siliga Setoga
SEE (2008) // Angela Tiatia
Creative Industries Research Institution window // 34 St Paul Street
This work was first exhibited in Pan Pacific Nation at The Arts at Marks Garage, Honolulu, Hawai’i in March 2009. The silent, slow-motion single shot video reflects on issues of gender politics, power and struggle, and fish as symbolic of the centrality of the ocean for Pacific islanders.
Angela Tiatia is an Auckland-based Samoan performance video installation artist currently studying at AUT Art and Design.
See (2008)
Single channel DVD, duration 3.28 mins
Angela Tiatia
BEBO WHITEBOARD ART VOLUME 1 (2006) // Allen Vili aka Onesian
Single channel DVD, duration 10 mins
Bennett’s Bookshop window // AUT Hikuwai Plaza
This video documents the making of whiteboard drawings using the FFART flash interface on Bebo.com.
Allen Vili is a south Auckland-based Samoan / Māori graphic designer behind the Onesian brand of Bebo skins, t-shirt design and custom-made hoodies.
PAN PACIFIC BRAND – LANDSCAPES + PORTRAITS (2009) // Siliga Setoga
Rectangle Box // Governor Fitzroy Place
This work was first exhibited in Pan Pacific Nation at The Arts at Marks Garage, Honolulu, Hawai’i in March 2009.
Siliga Setoga is an Auckland-based Samoan graphic designer behind the streetwear label Popo Hardwear, available at the Otara market.
Pan Pacific Brand – Landscapes + Portaits (2009)
Series of 24 prints on Kodak photo paper
Siliga Setoga
CONGRATULATIONS Janet Lilo!
The excellent Auckland-based video artist Janet Lilo (NZ Nga Puhi / Niue / Samoa) has been announced as the latest New Zealander to be resident artist in Sapporo, Japan under the JENESYS residency programme. Internationally recognised Avondaler Ms Lilo will rock the block in Sapporo. The opening of her solo show at Fresh Gallery Otara, MYFACE (12 June – 4 July 2009) will feature a live video cross to Ms Lilo – from Japan to Otara.
Install of TOP16 (2007) in Le Folauga, Khaosiung Museum of Fine Arts, Taiwan
CONGRATULATIONS Janet Lilo!
PK Night Southside AKL 08
This was my PK presentation in Manukau City during the inaugural Manukau Festival of Arts in 2008.
The official Pecha Kucha Night Aotearoa website now has the audio visual presentations of Janet Lilo, Serena Stevenson, Benjamin Work, Coco Solid, Jeremy Leatinu’u and Mathew Salapu Faiumu aka Anonymouz who appeared in Manukau’s first Pecha Kucha Night.
