Wellington’s local naked girl spreads her wings

Wellington’s local naked girl spreads her wings for academic dance adventures

Wellington born, bred and based live artist Virginia Kennard, self confessed “local naked girl”, has earned a place on the MA in Performance programme at Leeds Beckett University and flies away in 2 months time.

Paradox Photography

Virginia is known for her performance installation The Lady Garden, an exhibition of live naked women addressing issues of objectification, sexualisation, and the gaze. This work has been presented at several venues across Wellington and in Auckland (with a request for Stockholm/Edinburgh edition!) and, along with her work as a life model at almost every art class in town, has lead to Virginia’s infamy as “that naked girl”.
• Listen to her interview with Zoe George about the Art of Life modeling Etiquette here
http://www.radionz.co.nz/concert/programmes/upbeat/audio/201808836/the-art-of-etiquette-life-drawing-classes

For the last two years, Virginia has been developing her work on the gaze and the body further, holding an exhibition at Toi Poneke Gallery in June 2015 called you occupy my body by looking, including 17 days of new performances. She is constantly creating sound and movement works to investigate her ideas and is excited to now pursue a postgraduate qualification in the UK, delving into the academic side of her performance practice. Upon her return to Wellington, Virginia will be making work, seeking residencies, and collaborating with more local artists.
• More information about her exhibition can be found here
http://viggiq-youoccupymybodybylooking.strikingly.com/

Studying in Leeds will give Virginia the opportunity to re-forge her international connections made during her time living in Glasgow, as well as give her new avenues to create and perform her work. Awarded grants from Creative New Zealand and the Phoebe Maunsell estate, Virginia is also holding a crowd-funding campaign to raise money for her studies.
• Find her crowd-funding campaign here
http://www.boosted.org.nz/projects/ma-in-performance

She is soon to perform in an avant-garde collage of performances called Sacramental Melodrama, and a sound collaboration of which she is part is featuring at Sound:Gender:Feminism:Activism 2016, London. Virginia is super excited to embark on her academic arts adventure, focusing her dance training, queer and feminist theory interests, and performance practice, for a year in such a vibrant arts hub amidst the international community.

“And don’t worry, i’ll be getting naked a bit in Leeds too,” she says.

ENDS

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