Contributors

Rob Garrett

Rob Garrett is Director of art consultancy company Rob Garrett Contemporary Fine Art. Previously Head of the Dunedin School of Art, he also has a long background in arts advocacy, in arts development with Creative New Zealand, with arts festivals and in art writing.

Articles

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Walking with letters: Michael Parekowhai, John Reynolds, John Pule
This article looks at the recent works of New Zealand artists Michael Parekowhai, John Pule and John Reynolds to explore notions of identity through text and image relations. Parekowhais sculptural piece The Indefinite Article spells out I AM HE in an ironic critique of Colin McCahon and goes further through wordplay to cement a link between the word, identity and the complexities of translation. Reynolds Cloud comprised of nearly 7,000 white canvases transcribed with words from Harry Orsmans Oxford Dictionary of New Zealand English and acts to illuminate New Zealands separate identity and regional diversity within a worldwide community of English speakers. Stories of migration, of dispossession, of alienation characterise the work of John Pule. Similar to Parekowhai and Reynolds, Pule deploys words to multiply meanings and confound interpretation or translation.
The Word As Art
Riddoch Unley Museum Bendigo Art Gallery Carclew Flinders University Art Museum