Photo: supplied
From the controversial ‘90s sculpture ‘Virgin in a Condom’ to the recent defacement of an English version of the Treaty of Waitangi, our national museum Te Papa has allowed art to provide an important space for discussion.
That role of the museum is just one of the ways poet, novelist and essayist Ian Wedde explores opening out space through culture in his third volume of collected nonfiction writing, The Social Space of the Essay.
Covering the period of 2003 to 2023, it features writing ranging from reviews to lectures - a selection of some of Wedde’s cultural thinking in the 20 years since he left his position as Head of Art and Visual Culture at Te Papa. It includes tributes to artists he has followed like the late Bill Hammond, Bill Culbert and Ralph Hotere.
Wedde has long been interested in the way we view ourselves and provide space in our galleries and museums for our ‘unruly contradictory ideas’. As the 2009 public artwork by Michael Parekowha ‘Yes we are’ on the cover declares, popping brightly, Wedde’s role has been to keep things ‘open’.
What also becomes clear in the book is that this in a postcolonial nation involves ‘decentring’. In particular, recognising Aotearoa New Zealand’s place as part of the Pacific. In the book Wedde refers to the late writer, Dr Minoru Hokari, musing on there being no one authentic centre. Instead, as in indigenous Aboriginal thinking, “networking among any sites, countries and people.” A place where contradictions can coexist. It’s an attitude that has become increasingly common in museum practice.
Ian Wedde Photo: Ebony Lamb Photography
Prolific in his writing, as critic Ian Wedde has remained largely independent of institutions. That is, with the notable exception of Te Papa where he started in 2003 when it was being conceived.
It was here, in its first year, 1998 Wedde and the team were to face plenty of heat for the presentation of Tania Kovatt’s ‘Virgin in a Condom’ in touring Pictura Britannica Exhibition. Similarly for the opening Parade exhibition, which exhibited fine art like a Colin McCahon painting next to a Kelvinator Foodarama 7 fridge. Elsewhere Te Papa placed art in conversation with other parts of the museum while, more controversially, not retaining a national art gallery. It was to largely withdraw from both strategies later.
Whether writing a series of essays in the NZ Listener in the early 2000s or delivering a lecture at the National Library, it is common for Wedde to ask a stream of questions. In one article on the Australian sculptor Patricia Piccinini, there are 17 questions in a row. The key one? “What’s normal?”
“I value the essay as a social space,” Wedde begins this new book. He calls the essay “conversational thinking out loud”. He relishes the opportunity to take an idea “for a walk”: teasing it out, rather than trying to lock it down.
The Social Space of the Essay is published by Te Herenga Waka Press and is out now.
