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Cinema Divina and Autotheory: An Interview with Marilyn Freeman (2022)

February 23, 2023 •

An article co-authored with Marilyn Freeman

‘The Memoir of J. F. Rudd’ (2022-23) Bronze sc

‘The Memoir of J. F. Rudd’ (2022-23) Bronze sculpture; film projection.

This suite of autotheoretical artworks reimagines the Anzac legend. My intention is to challenge commemorative practices. In the film, my voice halting reads the handwritten memoir of a World War One veteran, while this same memoir is meticulously threaded with thousands of bronze beads. In The Memoir of J. F. Rudd, I foreground my autobiographic self—a self that isn’t demographically visible within the Anzac legend yet remains subject to its influence.

One of my thinking companions is Anzac WWI veteran, Lance Corporal James Foster Rudd (1891–1982). I found Rudd to be poetic and a wonderful storyteller whom I admire. By virtue of his association with the Anzac legend, Rudd’s personal experiences are understood through it. By virtue of the locations in which I was raised, I also understand myself through the legend, even though I don’t see myself in it. This becomes a troubled merger of individual and collective identity. It is further compounded because the Anzacs are not seen as individuals but as a “collective entity” into which Rudd’s distinctiveness is compressed.

I explore this complicated weaving of individual and collective identity by co-centring my own and Rudd’s experiences with the Anzac legend through artistic practices such as threading beads, narrating, self-filming, swimming, and bronze casting. These artistic practices aim to disrupt the prevailing heroic narrative of the Anzac legend, in a shift away from what, in her essay, The Carrier Bag Theory of Fiction, Ursula K. Le Guin terms the “killer story.”

These works challenge the institutional frameworks of collective remembering (and forgetting) that play into the instrumentalization of Anzac narratives for national identity. I shift the focus of the Anzac narrative from that of conflict, violence, conquering, or being conquered to storytelling as a process of ongoing change and development.
This artwork is on display in ‘Approaching Home’, a joint exhibition with @cmborland at @aratoimuseum. Photos: 1-2 Keith Hunter; 3 Lucia Zanmonti; 4-9 @cat.auburn

‘How to Make a Miniature of the Demolition of th

‘How to Make a Miniature of the Demolition of the Eighteen Arch Ashlar Bridge at Asluj, First World War, 1917’ (2019 – 2024) is a suite of artworks undertaken over five years: a sculpture cast in bronze and made with 30 meters of bobbin lace woven from my own hair, and a time-lapse video essay that follows the creation of the sculpture.

This suite of artworks interrogates the sense of dissonance I feel when experiencing representations of the Anzac legend. This sense of dissonance has compelled me to find a different approach to the forms of nostalgic reenactment and material languages of commemoration typical of Anzac memorial.

This artwork uses a photograph of a bridge demolished by Anzac troops in South Palestine during WWI as a starting point. It captures one of many tales exemplifying Anzac character traits bequeathed to contemporary Aotearoa: masculine stoicism and understated resourcefulness.

This narrative was complicated by my experience in Jordan in 2018. I was told that Aotearoa New Zealanders are not popular in Jordan because ‘we’ were the foot soldiers who helped implement the British Mandate in the region, resulting in decades of unrest in the Middle East. This ran counter to the narrative I had grown up with: that New Zealanders have only had a positive influence on international events.

By filming myself sculpting the scene at Asluj, including my own voice and stories within the film, using my hair as material, and casting the traditional commemorative material bronze at a domestic rather than monumental scale, I use artistic materials and processes to theorise what it would be like to experience myself within an Anzac narrative. In this way I autotheoretically question how my own national identity operates from an international position, both as an antagonist when positioned within Jordan, and as Pākehā whilst living in Scotland and unable to visit ‘home’ during the COVID-19 pandemic.

This artwork is on display in ‘Approaching Home’, a joint exhibition with @cmborland at @aratoi museum.

Images: 1-5 Lucia Zanmonti; 6-9 @catauburn; 10 Palestinian Exploration Fund, London.

We have officially wrapped up our Te Whare Hēra r

We have officially wrapped up our Te Whare Hēra residency! Huge thanks to everyone who supported us along the way and pivoted so quickly to accommodate Christine’s access needs. @tewharehera
@aratoimuseum @toi_rauwharangi @wgtncc @massey_finearts @massey_textiles
@lily_dowd_
@caroline_mcquarrie @johannamechen @gabrielleamodeo

It’s been an incredible journey, and we’re so grateful for the opportunity. Residencies like this are essential for artists – they offer us the chance to explore new ideas, challenge ourselves, and connect more deeply with our work and the communities around us.

Our ‘Approach Home’ exhibition is still open @aratoimuseum until October 27th, so be sure to check it out if you’re in Masteron.

Photos: @cmborland @cat.auburn @moonpurr @caroline_mcquarrie

#christineborland #catauburn #contemporaryart #contemporaryartscotland #contemporaryartaotearoa #contemporaryartnewzealand
#TextileCommunity #scottishwomenartists #masterton #wellington #ayrshire #argyll&bute

“Charkha Conversations” Cat Auburn and Christi

“Charkha Conversations”
Cat Auburn and Christine Borland (2024). Letters on hand-made harakeke paper, Charkha spinning wheel.

“Approaching Home” includes a new, collaborative artwork by Cat and Christine based on an archival source: “The Report of the Flax Commissioners, 1870” which documents an exchange of research, fibre and botanical samples between Aotearoa and Scotland relating to commercialising production of the plant-fibre sacred to Māori, harakeke. Named by Europeans as New Zealand Flax, descendants of the original plant samples still grow in Scotland today.

Counter to the many letters which form part of the Report, the artists’ exchange is a conversation between friends, led by personal encounters with harakeke. The dialogue forms an important, live component of the exhibition; Cat and Christine were originally meant to travel to Aotearoa together, however Christine remains in Scotland due to illness.

The letters are handwritten on paper made from harakeke, sourced around the artists’ home. Embracing the slow exchange of written information, Cat and Christine share encounters and learn from the individuals and communities who care for harakeke in Scotland and Aotearoa, acknowledging the global significance of Māori traditions in narrating complex dialogues around the shared colonial histories and futures of textile production.

The letters are exhibited alongside a portable Book Charkha spinning wheel, a tool which binds both artist’s practices, through production of the numerous hand spun threads in
“Approaching Home”. The Charkha was designed by Mahatma Ghandi as both a means to financial independence for all India’s citizens, and a method of non-violent protest, successful in re-establishing the local textile industry, away from Colonial British control.
📷 @cmborland Lucia Zanmonti @cat.auburn
#harakeke
#christineborland #catauburn #contemporaryart #contemporaryartscotland #contemporaryartaotearoa #contemporaryartnewzealand
#TextileCommunity #scottishwomenartists #masterton #wellington #ayrshire #argyll&bute

Please join us for our online artist talk 23rd Sep

Please join us for our online artist talk
23rd September 2024
7:00pm NZ 8:00am UK
For Zoom Link Email Lily Dowd
L.dowd@massey.ac.nz

We invite you to join us for an online discussion facilitated by Sarah McClintock, about our current exhibition Approaching Home.

Approaching Home is a meeting of works by two female artist-friends from different generations, connected across the world by a shared settler colonial history. Cat is from Aotearoa and now lives in Argyll, Scotland. Christine was born in Ayrshire and her home is also in Argyll.

The artists have collaboratively produced the exhibition, focusing on carefully
chosen materials, processes and iterative works to introduce and question the
concept of ‘home’ through shared colonial histories, ecological pathways and
endangered making traditions.

Approaching Home is on now at @aratoimuseum
Exhibition supported by the Jan Warburton Trust and @tewharehera

Image: Lucia Zanmonti

Our exhibition ‘Approaching Home’ has official

Our exhibition ‘Approaching Home’ has officially opened @aratoimuseum! Details to follow about a public program of events, both in person and online.

‘Approaching Home’ is a meeting of works by two female artist-friends from different generations, connected across the world by a shared settler colonial history. Cat is from Aotearoa and now lives in Argyll, Scotland. Christine was born in Ayrshire and her home is also in Argyll.

The artists have collaboratively produced the exhibition, focusing on carefully chosen materials, processes and iterative works to introduce and question the concept of ‘home’ through shared colonial histories, ecological pathways and endangered making traditions.

Cat’s bronze, film and textile-based artworks were developed during a period of doctoral research into trans-Tasman Anzac-related narratives of national identity and collective memory. Christine’s on-going series’ of film, cloth and printworks attend to both historical and future-facing lore surrounding the growing and hand-working of plant-based textiles.

Approaching Home works with shared material culture, autotheoretical art practices and intentional knowledge-sharing, to weave enduring cross-cultural conversations.

With thanks to @tewharehera Artist Residency and The Jan Warburton Trust for supporting our exhibition 🤍

Additional support from @northumbriauni #HopeScottTrust
@creativenz #northernbridgeconsortium @weareukri #UKRI #AHRC
@toi_rauwharangi @wgtncc #dickinstitute @c_n_o_s_

#christineborland #catauburn #contemporaryart #contemporaryartscotland #contemporaryartaotearoa #contemporaryartnewzealand
#TextileCommunity #scottishwomenartists #masterton #wellington #ayrshire #argyll&bute

Exciting news! Our artwork has arrived in Aotearoa

Exciting news! Our artwork has arrived in Aotearoa New Zealand, and we’re about to start installing it @aratoimuseum. It is a huge gallery space and we’re up for the challenge of filling it with the contents of this wee crate - thankfully threads and fibres pack down small! Working collaboratively, yet remotely is an encounter of care and friendship - we appreciate the support of the staff at Aratoi and @tewharehera in giving us the time and space to collaborate across timezones - there is currently an 11 hour time difference between Scotland and Aotearoa but waking up to lots of video notes is a real joy!

Thanks to the Jan Warburton Trust for helping us with shipping, and to @constantine and @globalspecialisedservices for the safe delivery our artwork across the world.

#christineborland #catauburn #contemporaryart #contemporaryartscotland #contemporaryartaotearoa #contemporaryartnewzealand #TextileCommunity #scottishwomenartists

Image by @moonpurr

Cat has arrived in Aotearoa New Zealand! 🌿✨ I

Cat has arrived in Aotearoa New Zealand! 🌿✨ It is the first week of our artist residency with Christine attending virtually at @tewharehera in Wellington. Thank you to @moonpurr @mrhicksetc @febvrerichards @lily_dowd_ @caroline_mcquarrie, and the teams at @toi_rauwharangi and @aratoimuseum for making us feel so welcome.

Photo 1: L Christine Borland, photo by @realifersross. R Cat Auburn at Te Whare Hēra, photo by @moonpurr
Photo 2: L Kilcreggan waterfront, Scotland. R Wellington harbour, Aotearoa.

#christineborland #catauburn #contemporaryart #contemporaryartscotland #contemporaryartaotearoa #contemporaryartnewzealand
#TextileCommunity #scottishwomenartists

About Me

Cat Auburn is an Aotearoa New Zealand artist based in Scotland. Read More…

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Latest Posts

Introduction for Special Issue ‘Autotheory in Contemporary Visual Arts Practice’ (2023)
Cinema Divina and Autotheory: An Interview with Marilyn Freeman (2022)
Conversations with Cripplewood (2015)

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