Bollards and The Comedy of Hyperindustrialisation

@saintbollard is the moniker that Andrew Choate uses when performing in relation to bollards - the typically concrete and steel posts that form obstructions to traffic in order to protect buildings, equipment, and pedestrians. His images serve as an entry into a world of poems, songs, and stories that highlight the existential and comedic dilemma of making peace with the inanimate objects that surround us.

Winner of Best Visual/ Performance Art Award and the Warwick Broadhead Memorial Award at the 2016 Dunedin Fringe Festival. This will be his first time performing in Wellington.

Slate dubbed him "the world's foremost bollard photographer," and his project has been featured by Instagram, Atlas Obscura, the Canadian Broadcast Corporation, Quartz, and the Otago Daily Times.

His bold visual and spoken-word performances can seem both choreographed and stream-of-conscious. The large and small mysteries of life and the ways one tries to inhabit a world shaped by others are at the forefront of Choate’s work. He is the author of several books including Learning (Civil Coping Mechanisms), Stingray Clapping (Insert Blanc Press), Too Many Times I See Every Thing Just The Way It Is (Poetic Research Bureau), and Language Makes Plastic of the Body (Palm Press). He was born and raised in Columbia, South Carolina and now lives and works in Los Angeles, CA.