Media release

Blue Oyster searches for new Director after recent move

Dunedin's Blue Oyster Project Art Space is searching for a new Director after its recent move to 16 Dowling Street. The Blue Oyster is a non-profit gallery that allows artists to exhibit experimental, non-commercial work, and has just recently moved from a basement location off Moray Place into more spacious surrounds in the arts district of Dowling Street, Dunedin.

The current director, Jamie Hanton, is leaving to take up a fixed-term position as Art Collections Curator at the University of Canterbury, Christchurch, after three years of directing the Blue Oyster.

Dr Jonathan W. Marshall, a long-serving member of the Blue Oyster Board of Trustees, said the gallery had continued to develop and expand under Hanton’s directorship.

"The Blue Oyster was founded as an artist cooperative in 1999, and has gone on to become an important public institution in the South Island,” Marshall explained. “We are the most established project space in the Otago region, and routinely feature artists from Australia and other locations, as well as New Zealand and Dunedin. The Board has been working hard for many years looking at ways to improve our profile and to secure a space which is more conducive to our long term goals. Jamie has been instrumental in facilitating this change, and he will be sorely missed by the Board, the Dunedin community, and by the many artists whose work he has so ably supported whilst he has been here.”

“Jamie leaves the gallery in an excellent position, poised to enter a new phase in its history and status,” Marshall added.“The Board wishes Jamie all the very best in his new role, and we look forward to working with a new director in early 2014 as we work to consolidate on these developments and to actively build and strengthen our exhibitions programmeand outreach.”

The position is being advertised nationally from today (4 December 2013). Applications close on 23 December 2013 and the trustees hope to have an appointment made by mid January 2014, when Jamie takes up his position in Christchurch.

ENDS

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