Visual artists awarded international residencies
Two international artist residencies, offered by Creative New Zealand as part of its international residencies
programme, have been awarded to New Zealand visual artists - Ronnie van Hout and Chris Braddock.
Van Hout, who grew up in Christchurch but is currently based in Wellington, will take up the $60,000 one-year residency
at the Künstlerhaus Bethanien in Berlin in August 2004. Auckland artist Chris Braddock was awarded a $45,000 residency
to spend four months from February to May 2004 in New York at the International Studio and Curatorial Program.
Murray Shaw, Chair of the Arts Board of Creative New Zealand, said the Board offered a range of international
residencies for New Zealand artists.
"The Berlin and New York residencies are partnerships with prestigious institutions," he said. "They expand
opportunities for New Zealand artists to work in a new, critical context and present their work to an international
audience. They also expose the artists to new experiences and provide valuable networking opportunities.
"Ronnie and Chris are established artists with international reputations and these residencies will enhance their
international careers."
The residencies include the artists' airfares, stipends and studio fees. The host organisations provide administrative,
curatorial, exhibition and publication support. At the Künstlerhaus Bethanien, the artist's work is exhibited while the
New York residency organises open studio shows and critiques of the artist's work.
Announcing van Hout's selection, Boris Kremer, Director of the International Studio Programme at Künstlerhaus Bethanien,
said the jury's choice was motivated by the quality and originality of Ronnie van Hout's work.
"His wit and sense for self-derision, applied to 'serious' issues of identity building, belonging and the search for
individuality, make his works one of the most atypical and refreshing practices to have come from New Zealand in recent
years," Mr Kremer said.
Van Hout is a painter, sculptor, printmaker and photographer, who says he uses "whatever is appropriate or inappropriate
for the work undertaken". This includes sound, film video, mechanics, embroidery and digital technology - "found and
stolen".
He is represented by Hamish McKay Gallery in Wellington, Ivan Anthony in Auckland and the Darren Knight Gallery in
Sydney.
A mid-career survey of his recent work features in the touring show, I've Abandoned Me, opening at the Auckland Art
Gallery Toi o Tämaki on 12 December.
Van Hout's collaborations include work with Michael Stevenson, the 2002 recipient of the biennial Künstlerhaus Bethanien
residency and New Zealand's representative at this year's Venice Biennale. He has also collaborated with rock band Into
the Void since 1988.
Mr Kremer said van Hout's thematic interests, linking personal history to world events, and use of a wide range of
techniques - from models, sculptures and installations to photography - make his work stand out in the international
landscape.
"Van Hout's interest in Europe, and more particularly in Berlin's tormented history, is reflected in his proposed
project and will, I'm sure, make his residency extremely worthwhile."
Describing the Künstlerhaus Bethanien residency as "a great set-up for an artist", van Hout said: "The work I'd like to
make there is connected with my European heritage. I'll be attempting to reconnect aspects of my parents' lives
together, including their emigration from Europe to New Zealand, and then my own connection with Europe. There are
parallels between this process of repatriation and the reunion of the two halves of Berlin.
"I'm looking forward to getting stuck into the work, and being a part of the atmosphere of Bethanien and Berlin."
Chris Braddock, a multi-media sculptor and lecturer at the Auckland University of Technology, can now add the residency
at the International Studio and Curatorial Program in New York to his list of international study opportunities. Trained
originally at Canterbury University, he did post-graduate study at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in Paris and the Courtauld
Institute in London.
He was the first New Zealander to get a Pollock-Krasner Foundation grant in 1993. His work has often occupied territory
that explores the tension between sexuality and religion/spirituality. His recent work, which deals with the fragmented
body, discusses ideas of the artist as ethnographer. This was most recently manifest in cast silicon as part of
Bodylogue, a group show with Gavin Hipkins and New York-based Kiki Smith at Gow Langsford Gallery in Auckland.
"The residency is a fantastic opportunity for me," Braddock said. "A concentrated four-month residency stint at the ISCP
will give me the opportunity to work through some projects that have been on the boil for a while. It's also going to be
great to have time just to look at art, talk to people, research and make some work."
As well as making work in the studio programme, Braddock will research the Provenance Research Project at the Museum of
Modern Art, which documents missing works of art in continental Europe during the Nazi era. He will also look at the
work of American artists Robert Smithson and Louise Nevelson, housed in various New York collections.
Braddock is represented by Bartley Nees Gallery in Wellington, Gow Langsford Gallery in Auckland and Sydney, and Galerie
Romerapotheke in Zurich.
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BIOGRAPHICAL DETAILS
Ronnie van Hout:
Ronnie van Hout was born in 1962 in Christchurch. From 1980 to 1982, he studied at the Ilam School of Fine Arts,
Canterbury University where he majored in film studies. From 1989-1992, he attended Photo Access in Christchurch, then
Christchurch Polytechnic in 1995, and the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology (1998-1999).
He has worked in both New Zealand and Australia, and is currently Massey University's artist-in-residence at the Rita
Angus Cottage in Wellington.
In 1994, he was granted a studio residency through the ELBA Art Foundation in Nijmegen, Holland. In 1996, he
participated in the artist-in-residence programme at the Govett-Brewster Art Gallery (in association with Taranaki
Polytechnic) in New Plymouth. In 1999, he was the recipient of the International Studio and Curatorial Program in New
York.
He is represented in both private and public collections in New Zealand and Australia, including Te Papa Tongarewa,
Waikato Museum of Art and History, Robert McDougall Art Gallery, Govett-Brewster Art Gallery, Dunedin Public Art Gallery
and the National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne. He is represented by Hamish McKay Gallery in Wellington, Ivan Anthony
in Auckland and the Darren Knight Gallery in Sydney.
Chris Braddock:
Chris Braddock was born in Waiuku, Auckland in 1962. He studied at Canterbury University, School of Fine Arts, Ecole des
Beaux-Arts (Paris) and the Courtauld Institute (University of London). He is a senior lecturer in art and design at
Auckland University of Technology.
In 1994, his work was included in Station to Station: The Way of the Cross, 14 contemporary artists, Auckland Art
Gallery Toi o Tämaki, curated by William McAloon. In 1998, his work featured in Sharp & Shiny: Fetishism in Contemporary New Zealand Art, Govett Brewster Art Gallery, curated by John Hurrell. Votive
Mutation, 1999, marked a turning point for Braddock in its exploration of ornamentation, religion, fetishism and the
body. Recent exhibitions include the New Zealand Jewellery Biennale, Grammar: Subjects & Objects, curated by Deborah Crowe on behalf of the Dowse Museum and Changing Spaces, an outdoor sculpture installation
for the New Zealand International Arts Festival 2002. Also in 2002, he exhibited in Sydney at the Gow Langsford Gallery
in Resisting Colour, along with Judy Millar, Cy Twombly and Damien Hirst. Last year, he co-curated Votive: sacred and
ecstatic bodies at the Adam Art Gallery in Wellington and the Dunedin Public Art Gallery, along with Ian Breakwell,
Cathy de Monchaux, Pierre et Gilles and Megan Jenkinson.
Braddock is one of the founding members of pp, an annual artist-run project of visual and performing arts in Auckland.
He is represented in both private and public collections in New
Zealand and internationally, including Te Papa Tongarewa, Robert McDougall Art Gallery, The Chartwell Trust, Auckland
Art Gallery Toi o Tämaki, the Wallace Trust Collection, New Zealand Post and the Ecole des Beaux-Arts, Paris.
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