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Korero korero (Telling stories) was a joint exhibition with Sarah Buist in a wing of the Sarjeant Gallery, Whanganui / Wanganui. | |||
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Sarah installed her work on the central panel and on the right side of the wing and Sonja assembled her work on the left side.
12 photograph-montage of members of Ngati Ranana (London Maori Club) is by Sarah Buist. Dans le jardin des beaux arts (the snail forms), Stars for feet, (transparency of child's foot) Video compilation, Grains of Salt, Virtue of the Rose (small objects on the back wall), A Tangled Tale (on right wall), Certain Measures (sticks on the table), detail of a work on the right by Sarah Buist. In the exhibition: Korero korero, Sarjeant Gallery, W(h)anganui, New Zealand / Aotearoa, 2000. |
Above: Sarah discussing her work in the right side of the wing
with students from the art school. She built a false wall and hung pompoms (visible through the windows) behind this. Around the walls she hung drawings and paintings. In the central space there were drawings made by participants in her workshops.   |
Left: Detail of the back wall showing one of the two postcards of the work Tulips from Instanbul |
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Overview near the end of the two month exhibition.
The walls were bare in the beginning with just the postcards and the small framed works, as well as the single black thread hanging from the ceiling in the left corner. I added the horns on the right about a month into the exhibition. On the evening of the opening I wrote the text: The princess received a magic collection of threads and was told that she should pull out a thread whenever she was unhappy. When the thread came out the unpleasant time would be over. Soon most of the threads were gone and the princess was an old old woman. in the left corner. This is the same text on the second largest snail form. On reading this text on the in the corner, if anyone looked up they would see this single thread that seems to unwind from a corner of the ceiling. The videos shown on the tv were: Savour the Experience, 6 min, English text. Athena, 2 min, music by Evren Celimli, U.S.A. Essences and Particularities, 6 min, music by Evren Celimli. Wrapping for a Marginal Citizen, 12 min, music by M. Verheecke. Crossing, 5 min, music by Ben Koen + Joe Feidler, U.S.A. Grains of Salt, 6 min, text in English and Dutch. |
 Detail of the back wall showing Virtue of the Rose, (lower left) Stars for feet, and a member of the public writing a text on the wall as part of one of the workshops. |
Detail showing Grains of Salt. |
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On a day that I'd removed the snails, a class of 5 year olds arrived wanting to know what had happened to the snails, so I handed them out to groups of children, with the request that each group had to decide where to lay out the snail and then to do this.
They then helped each other to read the texts. |
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 The text here reads: "You Challenge me?", laughed the hare. |
 One of the larger snails bearing a text taken from Ihimaera's book, The Matriach. Here the forces of nature are described vividly as a means for revealing new things to the seeker or traveller. |
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Other locations for this work and works related to this theme (2000 - 4)
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the medium |  | c.v. last things first |