Close Up

29 September 2018: Mappings: Landscape, Memory, Histories

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Aperture presents a programme of artists’ shorts from New Zealand, exploring indigenous lives, shared histories and remoteness, in partnership with CIRCUIT Artist Film and Video Aotearoa New Zealand.

Invisible Territories
Lucy Aukafolau
2012 | 8 min | Colour | Digital 

A three channel sequenced video installation comprised of footage taken during Aukafolau’s first trip to Tonga with her father and uncle to their homeland in ‘O‘ua Ha‘apai. Adopting the role of an observer, her participation in the journey is guided not by personal way-finding intentions but rather attempts to situate and orient her experience of place within her father and uncle’s collective memory of ‘O‘ua. The flurry of activity at sea brings to life the importance of the ocean as a means of travel and communication, evoking the prophetic visions of the late Epeli Hau’ofa and his notion of a “Sea of Islands” where Pacific islands are connected rather than separated by the sea.”

An Unsuccessful Attempt at Chasing Fog
Layne Waerea
2012 | 7 min | Colour | Digital

February 18, 6:43 a.m., 2012. Instructions: to chase fog from a neighbouring farm. Looking at the nature (and obsession) of land ownership in Aotearoa.

Ziarah
Bridget Reweti
2018 | 11 min | Colour | Digital

Bridget Reweti’s Ziarah takes to the open sea in search of the remains of Tupaia, a nobleman from Raiatea in the Society Islands who was indispensable in liaising between Māori and the crew of James Cook’s ship the Endeavour on its first visit to Aotearoa New Zealand in 1769. Part of a series of works curated by UK-based academic Dr Erika Balsom and commissioned by CIRCUIT Artist Film and Video Aotearoa New Zealand. Saturday 29 September 2018: Mappings: Landscape, Memory, Histories

Can I Be in Your Video
Bridget Reweti
2012 | 4 min | Colour | Digital

This work shows the construction of a camera obscura tent on an isolated beach of Te Tai Poutini. Reminiscent of late 1800s surveyors tents, the camera obscura tent simulates the three-legged taipō, a surveying tool Māori referred to as a goblin. The opposing channel shows the inverted tent scenes of Lake Wahapo and Kā Roimata o Hine Hukatere (Franz Joseph Glacier).

Mai I Te Kei O Te Waka Ki Te Ihu O Te Waka
Jeremy Leatinuu
2018 | 8 min | B/W | Digital

Jeremy Leatinuu turns his attention to the journey of the waka Tainui and its people to Aotearoa. Part of a series of works curated by UK-based academic Dr Erika Balsom and commissioned by CIRCUIT Artist Film and Video Aotearoa New Zealand.

This Fine Island
Gavin Hipkins
2012 | 12 min | Colour | Digital

Shot on 16mm colour negative film, This Fine Island revisits Charles Darwin’s journey to the Bay of Islands in New Zealand in 1835. In this poetic adaption, Darwin’s nineteenth-century travel writing in The Voyage of the Beagle becomes a vehicle for present day tourisms, travel romance, and racial othering, against the backdrop of New Zealand’s lush landscape.


As part of this New Zealand focus, Aperture also hosts a screening of narrative shorts from New Zealand and Pacific Islands, looking at cultural identities, crisis and conflict, and social relations at The Royal Academy of Arts on Sunday 30 September 2018, 2pm. This is a free event organised by Day for Night as part of Aperture: Asia & Pacific Film Festival in response to the upcoming exhibition Oceania at The Royal Academy of Arts. New Zealand and Pacific Island passport holders get free admission to the Oceania exhibition.

Image credit: An Unsuccessful Attempt at Chasing Fog by Layne Waerea. Courtesy of the artist and CIRCUIT.

All films courtesy of CIRCUIT Artist Film and Video Aotearoa New Zealand: www.circuit.org.nz