Wk 2 // Podcast notes
- annabensky
- Mar 5, 2023
- 4 min read
Art Not Science Podcast: Carl Mika - "Wā and its countercolonial possibilities: Implications for the human self"
all things are in a state of profound "nowness" and interconnection. In Te Ao Māori, acknowledgement of the eternal omnipresence of spiritual reality in the everyday; the earth and ether of being (all); the "oneness of all things"
wā when translated into English as "time" and/or "space" imposes a "colonial gloss" on the concept - no longer holistic; ontology of alienation; a problem/limitation of language; the West/Western rationality has created divisions in Māori reality that didn't exist prior to colonisation
When wā is translated into Western language/ideology, it becomes linear and one dimensional, disregards unity, and places Māori in a linear place in the timeline of development and progress through a colonial lens; a separation from the spiritual realm and oneness; isolating
Borrows from Bergson's concept of "duration": "duration is ineffable and can only be shown indirectly through images that can never reveal a complete picture. It can only be grasped through a simple intuition of the imagination". In expanding on this via Māori knowledge, wā could refer to the convergence of all things in the world; "all encompassing, stupendous, excessive, unknowable" - distinct from that which is possible through human perception, but that also still concerns the human being by nature of being part of the all
The dominant Western model fragments the self by "throwing us into the elsewhere (a future space, mental picture, etc.); the self displaces itself from the messiness of the world and the now; taking oneself out of the picture by avoiding our own selves, emotions and feelings, attachments and dislikes"
historical Māori acknowledgement that illness can come from states of disconnectedness
Behind capitalism is a singling out of things in the world as individual objects; engagement with the nonhuman world valid in so far as experienced as a product of human awareness and existence; little to no acknowledgement of other realms of perceptions or proof
wā has a resonance to it (like aum); imperceivable, emanating from all existence; resistant to being grounded in language perhaps; wā as a living phenomenon
Am thinking about how language inherently comes with its own lenses and conventions, and the ones present in dominant cultural practices and narratives. How can I be mindful of these things whilst acknowledging their influence? In what ways can I use them in expansive methods, or that call them into question without getting bogged down in critique?
Art Not Science Podcast: "The moon and the pavement + Heavy trees, arms and legs"
Part 1 -The moon and the pavement exhibition artist talk
The idea of looking very closely at something very familiar, banal or everyday, which opens a space for discovery, imagination, fiction or reality converging
In communicating and relating across distance, we can foster a particular kind of intimacy
relationships, distance, intimacy
Artists: Susu - moved to Tāmaki Makaurau from Taiwan; centres around travelling and the emotions and experience of this; Sam Towse - Ilam graduate, deals with the urban landscape, infrastructure, concrete, rocks, detritus and taking observations from these spaces; Yukari Kaihori - Tāmaki Makaurau based, site specific focused practice, works generated from the hyperlocal, objectness/thingness, the modern human world and how we relate to human spaces.
S - digital sculpture and modelling as a means to dive into close memories activated through actions/experiences; projected video onto the floor, looking ‘into’ it from above; circling subtitles disrupt traditional perspectives of reading, no right way up. Video incorporates memories in relation to Tudigong (deity of soil and the ground), swimming, and lunar holiday fireworks; shifts between physical and metaphysical states.
Sam - building/constructing from elements of the city (pavements, fences, with things embedded in them); the flux of the city, crumbling, rebuilding, constantly changing, "skin flaking...like any other body"; ruptures; "setting them in stone", these temporal moments, magical items out of context; the permeability of space
Yukari - works with wax, glass, metals, organic plant matter... glass tiles that came from fascination of tiles and pebbles present in the gallery space; looked into the recycling of glass taking place in Ashburton (gallery site) via processing in Auckland; reflecting the hidden stories and relationships behind the mundane environments/objects we don't often think of. Also cast acorns and leaves in pewter from a tree planted by a mother who lost her sons in war; also cast agate (a common and precious mineral associated with Canterbury), playing with time in relation to a material that takes thousands of years to form, that we can admire it immediately but it is beyond our scale and perception temporally (I really love her practice and processes, and the concepts surrounding temporality and thingness in her work)
RNZ: "Nova Paul | Te Ao Māori Film Making"
Discusses Nova's recent film Hawaiki and its acceptance into the Sundance Film Festival schedule. Synopsis: "At the edge of the playground close to the forest, the children of Okiwi School made a refuge they call Hawaiki. Hawaiki has spiritual and metaphysical connections for Māori as the children create a space for their self-determination."
Part of a wider conversation around engagement with environment, climate, etc., and self determination
5 chapters; overarching theme of looking at the simple idea that trees have stories, and that every tree has a story. Each chapter begins with a portrait of a native tree (rākau); under each tree is a poetic response to the notion of sovereignty and self determination
Direct, observational, gentle; weaves in and out of the space and the children's conversations
Filmed on B&W 16mm film, hand processed with a developer created from the leaves of the tree that is featured. The image of the tree is produced by the tree itself; harkens back to early 19th century photographic processes
Exploring the materiality of film; and for Māori, the mauri that sits within an image and the subject matter being filmed
Centres around Okiwi School on Aotea (Great Barrier Island), where the children, both Māori and non-Māori, are holding their own space of place, choosing to call it Hawaiki - "a place Māori came from and return to, a refuge"
Multiple layers of thought; a moment in time that can resonate beyond itself
"Self-determinacy...doesn't have to be embattled, it can be joyful and flow. Our tamariki are teachers in this space"
Kaupapa Māori-led project - "living and breathing though the work itself" Am thinking about how the work can do the work... Observing rather than enforcing any kind of lens or intention on a subject; letting what is happening speak for itself, let the connection flow organically. There is an inevitable rhizomatic form to it all...
Still from Hawaiki
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