Connecting Threads
Joint exhibition: Matt Gauldie and Sofia Minson
22 November – 6 December / Preview: 5.30pm Tuesday 22 November

Connecting Threads: from birth to burial, life is a series of connections.

The threads that form our connections join people, land, history and the natural world -­‐ we rejoice when connections are made and oft times, grieve when they are broken.

Connecting Threads, the upcoming joint exhibition of new works by Matt Gauldie and Sofia Minson, is a visual representation of this theme: Gauldie and Minson individually explore the context of family lineage, mixed whakapapa and culture and the codes or expectations which are consciously, or unconsciously, passed down from one generation to the next.

Gauldie’s paintings depict the lives of an extended Maori family, living and working in a seaside village – a village that belongs in any rural New Zealand landscape.

With each piece capturing a different family member and their contribution to daily life, the work engages, drawing you into the threads that weave the people and the land that shapes and sustains them.

Gauldie creates a sense of place in his work by including the physical: his use of old car panels and paraphernalia found scattered around the local community provides a tangible link between the people and their landscape.

Sofia Minson’s mixed Maori (Ngati Porou), Swedish, English and Irish ancestry, has shaped her exploration of how we relate to the culture of our ancestors in a contemporary world.

Her portrait of New Zealand musician, Tiki Taane, with painted moko, is a powerful image of the connection he forges between himself, his whakapapa, and looking forward, his children.

Taane has worn his moko previously as artwork: inspired by C.F. Goldie portraits, he presents himself with full facial moko on the cover of his Past, Present, Future album.

The design of moko based on whakapapa new and old, is one that Minson sees echoed in “He taura whiri” or “plaited rope”, a concept beloved by Maori orators, describing disparate elements combined in a unity without loss of their individual identities -­‐ the thread of looking back and looking forward to discover how we are shaped.

Minson: “I feel there is no better time than now, after Tiki’s strength and amazing attitude in the face of the media attention on his legal issues over the last few months, to create this portrait.

In this painting he will proudly wear his moko, an outward sign of his inner growth and resilience”.

ENDS