Midnight/Worker
-
Ruth Buchanan
Te Atiawa, Māori
Taranaki, Māori
Title
Midnight/Worker
Details
| Production Date | 2019 |
|---|---|
| Collection(s) | Govett-Brewster Art Gallery collection. Purchased with support from the Govett-Brewster Foundation, Mossman Gallery, Jim and Mary Barr, Jennifer and Ken Horner, and Jenny and Andrew Smith. |
| Accession Number | 2020/6 |
| Media | Pongee silk curtain, rope and metal fixtures |
| Measurements | 2200 x 4800mm |
About
“Tāngia he rārangi kia tōhipa i waenganui,” te toai a Ruth Buchanan i tāna tuhinga i te tau 2013 e kīia ana ko ‘Make a case for movement’, i whakaputaina i te pukapuka o Reading Room, i te putanga tuaono. Koinei te hua o tāna tāreitanga i te tau 2019 e kīia ana ko Midnight/Worker – he papamaene e iri iho ana kia kitea te rārangi e tōhipa ana i te takiwā e kitea ana, me te tō mai i te kaimātakitaki. “Ko te whakaneke i te ārei te mahi e whakaū ana i tōna tikanga...” Ka whakamaharatia tātou e Buchanan. “He pātū kē te ārai e kore e neke.”
Tāngia he rārangi kia tōhipa i waenganui. I rō hōhipera au inātata tonu nei, e tākaihia ana ki ngā ārei kākariki e kaha tūwherahia ana me te tere kati hoki. He wā tōna ka hiahia au kia panonitia ngā ārei hei pātū – ka hōhā kē au i tā rātou whakahē ki te aukati i te ao i tōku ake takiwā. He pukā ngā ārei: ka tūrama mai, he oro, he kakara tonu, kāore e aukati rawa ana.
Tāngia he rārangi kia tōhipa i waenganui. Kua iri ki waenga i ngā pātū, i ngā poupou rānei, he rārangi kua tuhia e Midnight/Worker ki waenganui i te takiwā o te huarewa me tō mātou hono ā-tinana: he whakahau i a tātou ki te kite i ngā mea e tītoko ana, tērā pea kāore e tino kitea ana. Mā te tiro atu ki tua i te pōuriuri o Midnight/Worker, ko te takiwā ake hoki tētehi mea hei aromātai atu. Titiro atu anō: he pātū, he pou, he tuanui, he matapihi, he tatau. He aha ngā āheinga; he aha hoki ngā pareparenga?
—
“Draw a line through and across,” repeats Ruth Buchanan in her 2013 text ‘Make a case for movement’, published in Reading Room journal, issue 6. This is what her 2019 sculpture Midnight/Worker does—the suspended shroud of silk draws a line through and across the space in which it is shown, involving the viewer in this action. “A curtain relies on movement in order to function. . .” Buchanan reminds us. “A curtain that doesn’t move is a wall.”
Draw a line through and across. I spent time in hospital recently, cocooned inside a series of turquoise curtains constantly being opened and snapped closed. There were many times I wished the curtains were walls—irritated by their refusal to keep the surrounding world out of the small space which they designated mine. Curtains are porous: light, sounds, smells are filtered, not blocked.
Draw a line through and across. Hung between walls or columns, Midnight/Worker draws a line between the environment of the gallery and our bodily engagement with it: encouraging us to see those supporting structures we might not otherwise recognise. Looking across and beyond the dark haze Midnight/Worker, the space itself becomes something to be examined. Look again: a wall, a pillar, a roof, a window, a door. What does it enable; what does it obstruct?
— Hanahiva Rose, 2024
