Image courtesy of the artist
Photo Credit
Ashleigh Taupaki, All This Work Is Necessary, 2023. Courtesy of Cheska Brown.
Photo Credit
Ashleigh Taupaki, Map Layers 1 - 200, 2022-23, pen on tracing paper, rocks from Hauraki waterways. Courtesy of Cheska Brown.
Photo Credit
In All This Work Is Necessary, Ashleigh Taupaki presents a series of layered maps consisting of the archival text media and legislation that has negatively impacted the Hauraki wetlands. Spanning a period of 200 years, Taupaki draws wayfinders and annotations on nationally enacted bills to convey the systematic decline of these landscapes. Transparent papers line the gallery walls, weighed down by rocks sourced from Hauraki, to depict the publicly available literature that largely contributed to colonial operations within the region, namely the draining and removal of the swamps that Māori called home.
Ashleigh Taupaki (Ngāti Hako, Samoan) is a multidisciplinary artist based in Tāmaki Makaurau, working primarily in object, drawing, and research practices. Systems of power are interrogated through iwi and place-specific narratives; with decolonial methodologies embedded in the material processes, and collection of stories and knowledge. Using found, gifted, and natural materials, Taupaki has developed an expanded mind mapping practice that emphasises connectivities within social, cultural and environmental ecologies. Through community workshopping, Taupaki uses this mode of engagement to offer a sense of place and material agency to those outside of the institutional academic space in a way that fosters sharing, relationality and generosity.
In All This Work Is Necessary, Ashleigh Taupaki presents a series of layered maps consisting of the archival text media and legislation that has negatively impacted the Hauraki wetlands. Spanning a period of 200 years, Taupaki draws wayfinders and annotations on nationally enacted bills to convey the systematic decline of these landscapes. Transparent papers line the gallery walls, weighed down by rocks sourced from Hauraki, to depict the publicly available literature that largely contributed to colonial operations within the region, namely the draining and removal of the swamps that Māori called home.
Ashleigh Taupaki (Ngāti Hako, Samoan) is a multidisciplinary artist based in Tāmaki Makaurau, working primarily in object, drawing, and research practices. Systems of power are interrogated through iwi and place-specific narratives; with decolonial methodologies embedded in the material processes, and collection of stories and knowledge. Using found, gifted, and natural materials, Taupaki has developed an expanded mind mapping practice that emphasises connectivities within social, cultural and environmental ecologies. Through community workshopping, Taupaki uses this mode of engagement to offer a sense of place and material agency to those outside of the institutional academic space in a way that fosters sharing, relationality and generosity.
