Back of House

Office, storeroom, studio, workshop, archive. These are the hidden engine rooms that support the public presentation of art.  Back of House turns the tables on the art gallery, bringing together artists, art works, curators and technicians who make the tools of their trade and their working processes the subject of three discrete presentations, a “live” archiving project, and a curated public programme.

"Sophia Smolenski: Offering It Up"
Three years in the making, Sophia Smolenski’s installation uses the accoutrement of the mount-maker’s workshop and the furniture of exhibition display as frames for the presentation of 22 art works the artist has commissioned from a range of contemporary New Zealand makers who were invited to create items for display in response to mounts she first constructed for objects in her personal possession.

"Wendy Bornholdt: Studioland"
Wendy Bornholdt’s Studioland is a new gathering of her photographic prints that have emerged over the last decade in response to her sorting and archiving of drawings amassed over her career and stored in her studio. She re-imagines the activities of cataloguing, organising and storing art works as new ground for making art and the occasion for meditating on the workings of memory.

"Aro Toi/Art Collection in Focus: A Gift, A Celebration, An Invitation"
Curated by Curator, Collections Sophie Thorn
This is the second of two presentations in the Aro Toi / Art Collection in Focus series in the Gallery in 2023. It features three works on hiapo by Cora-Allan purchased in 2022 as part of the 125 celebrations at the University and a large Tongan ngatu gifted to the University as part of the centenary celebrations in 1999 by the University of the South Pacific. Situated in the Stairwell Gallery, Cora-Allan’s hiapo are accompanied by items borrowed from the artist for the occasion: shells, ike (tapa beaters) which she has been casting from resin, whenua pigment and videos of the artist’s technique for gathering kāpia ink. Wrapping the Lower Chartwell Gallery, the complete 50 langanga launima ngatu is on display for the first time since going into storage in 2008. The occasion serves as an opportunity to find out more about the ngatu and the ‘unknown Tongan village collective’ listed as the object’s makers. In addition, an invitation to New Zealand-born Tongan artist, 'Uhila Moe Langi Nai has been extended to develop a response to the ngatu that will be integrated into the Gallery’s future programme.