CoCA - Centre of Contemporary Art

When imagining my art history honours year I never thought I would end up here… writing a blog about my internship with a prestigious organisation, and actually enjoying what is said to be one of the most challenging years at university. But in saying that, I had never imagined I would be interning at the Centre of Contemporary Art (CoCA). I was afforded the opportunity through the University of Canterbury’s College of Arts Internship Programme. When I was told CoCA was on the cards, I put my hand up almost faster than the speed of light.

I started my internship with CoCA around the beginning of March 2015, and since then I have had my eyes opened to the incredible amount of work that goes on behind the scenes, of not only operating an art gallery, but also reopening one. My official role at CoCA has been ‘Collections Intern’. My role has entailed researching the historic and contemporary value of CoCA’s collection to fill in some gaps and provide as much information as possible.

New Zealand contemporary art isn’t an area I have delved into much before and I have thoroughly enjoyed learning about artists and works from across the country. I knew about artists such as Dick Frizzell, Bill Hammond and Shane Cotton, but there are many names in CoCA’s collection that I had not come across before, and whose stories I have found incredibly fascinating.

Ralph Hotere is a New Zealand artist who I have always found captivating. CoCA holds in its collections two Hotere lithographs from his Window in Spain series (above on the right is Window in Spain I, 1996). I had seen several of these works around various New Zealand galleries and museums, but never knew the story behind them. Finally, during my internship, I have been able to get to the bottom of it!

And so the story goes…

In 1978, Hotere returns to France in the company of Cilla McQueen (the poet and linguist who he had married in 1973). They base themselves at Avignon, a town dominated by the residence of the fourteenth-century Popes in exile, and set out for Italy and Spain. Pope Paul IV dies while the pair are in Avignon. The newspaper headlines read: “Le Pape est Mort”. Later in the year when staying in Menorca his successor John Paul I also dies. The headlines of the Spanish papers similarly read: “El Papa ha Muerto” = “The Pope is Dead”.  The Window in Spain series and the Avignon watercolours were the result of this visit.1

Gordon Crook also features in CoCA’s collection and has been an interesting story to research. Crook moved to New Zealand in 1972 at the age of 51 to pursue a quieter , less social life. He had a few small commissions in New Zealand before his big break came. He was asked to design twenty banners for the New Zealand Embassy in Washington. The banners, each five metres high and one metre wide, combine South Pacific imagery and heraldry, and are still apparently impressive to see. I think Crook appeals because it was so unusual for an artist to have tapestry as one of their main forms of expression. However Crook was never considered an artist for going along with norms! He once stated, “Because I work in a lot of media, people can’t get to grips with my work. The point is that oneself as an artist remains consistent. My object is to end up with something that I haven’t seen before, to get an image which I could not have imagined”.2

During my time at CoCA I have been able to apply years of study to a project with real-life implications. It has been thrilling to be able to contribute to such a longstanding testament to art in Christchurch. I have always thought of myself as an organised person both in terms of time and productivity, but working on this project has definitely challenged me on my earlier opinions of myself.

I have learned a great deal about the history of art in Canterbury and New Zealand and what a significant role CoCA has played. I’ve been able to meet artists, CoCA board members, and industry professionals; and learn about how much CoCA has meant to Christchurch. At the end of June I will have researched the background of every artwork in the CoCA collection and I feel very privileged to hold this knowledge!

Abbey Topham
Collections Intern, CoCA

1. Art-newzealand.com, ‘Art New Zealand’. N.p., 2015. Web. 12 May 2015.
2. Collections.tepapa.govt.nz, 'Topic: Biography Of Gordon Crook | Collections Online - Museum Of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa’. N.p., 2015. Web. 12 May 2015.

The concept of curating and directing CoCA has now become a reality. I have said my farewell to Plymouth in the UK and flown across the globe and landed in Christchurch. I am now well into my second week of work on New Zealand soil.

On route to Christchurch I was fortunate to experience the Venice Biennale. Located in a sensational, historic setting, this is the largest of the world’s biannual contemporary art events. Okwui Enwezor is the renowned curator of the main exhibition All the World’s Futures. On for another five months, the exhibition is essentially about the state of the world today and how artists are reacting to and making sense of global issues. The exhibition is spread across two sites: the Arsenale, a beautiful former rope and ship building yard; and the well-maintained Giardini (gardens), surrounded by 29 pavilions built from 1907 onwards by the various nations participating in this enduring Biennale. There is also a surprisingly extensive collateral programme of creative projects and exhibitions around the city.

Experiencing so much artwork in one place left me with many highlights and potential resonances for CoCA. The pavilions give you a sense of global contemporary art, some of the works clearly defining the state of artists’ respective countries.

Artist Simon Denny, who is representing New Zealand, was extremely well received. His project Secret Power was partly prompted by the impact of whistleblower Edward Snowden’s leaks of National Security Agency (NSA) PowerPoint slides which outlined top-secret US telecommunications surveillance programmes. These slides highlighted New Zealand’s role in US intelligence work, as a member of the US-led ‘Five Eyes’ alliance. Now out in the open, the slides have come to represent international surveillance work and its impact on individual privacy. Denny’s ‘Biennale Arte 2015’ project has gained lots of international press and put New Zealand in the spotlight in the ‘art world’.

For me, Chinese artist Xu Bing’s Phoenix (above) most powerfully aligned with the curator’s concept for the Venice Biennale. Throughout China’s history, every dynasty has had its form of phoenixes. Representing luck, unity, power and prosperity, these mythological birds have, for the most part, been benevolent, gentle creatures. The pair in this exhibition, made out of materials used for China’s commercial development, reflects the grimmer and grittier face of China today. Essentially, the phoenix expresses unrealised hopes and dreams.

An opportunity that I hope to bring to CoCA from Venice is a fantastic work by British/Ghanaian artist John Akomfrah. I have worked with Akomfrah and the production team Smoking Dogs over the last few years, resulting in commissioned work. Akomfrah is a polemic artist, and working with him has definitely impacted on my thinking as a curator.

Akomfrah’s presentation Vertigo Sea is on display in the Biennale’s Central Pavilion. It is a new three-screen/channel film installation about whaling, the environment and our relationship with the sea. For the last 30 years, spanning cinema, television and gallery-based installations, Akomfrah’s work has engaged with questions of memory and identity, creating moving-image works, which give a voice to African migration in Europe. He fills gaps in history using archival material to create documentary-style ‘film essays’ and speculative fictional stories about our past. He is renowned for pushing the boundaries of documentary film.

During my quick four days in Venice, I enjoyed making new connections and developing existing relationships, both with the art and with the people. I am looking forward to applying this learning to CoCA’s projects here in Christchurch.

I am a firm believer that to make knowledge and skills relevant to a location you have to first experience the place. I’m really looking forward to experiencing and learning about the city so I can get a sense of how CoCA can once again become a key focal point and resource for the public and local art communities. I am extremely excited to be here!

Kia ora koutou.

Paula Orrell
Director & Principal Curator, CoCA

Image: Xu Bing’s Phoenix (2015) hanging between two boathouses at the Arsenale.