黑料不打烊

Te Puna o Waiwhetu Christchurch Art Gallery has a long-standing tradition of curating exhibitions of emerging and early-career artists. We do this in order to contribute to the ecology of the local art world, as well as because 鈥� quite straightforwardly 鈥� we鈥檙e interested in the practices of artists at all stages of their careers, and would like to bring the work of outstanding younger artists to wider public attention. The Devil鈥檚 Blind Spot is the latest in this ongoing series, but unlike earlier exhibitions, it鈥檚 concerned with a single medium 鈥� photography.

Although it doesn鈥檛 attempt to be a comprehensive survey, The Devil鈥檚 Blind Spot brings together a wide range of contemporary photographic practices. At one end of the spectrum are artists who use deliberately anachronistic technologies, such as large-format view cameras and analogue film. Their images may be hand-printed in a darkroom, or scanned and delivered as digital files. At the other end are artists who work with computer codes and data, and whose photographic practices might involve online distribution and interaction. There are artists who make photobooks and those who produce cameraless photographs; artists who incorporate photographs into mixed-media installations or who are concerned with the creative possibilities of photographic 鈥榝ailure鈥�; artists who explore aspects of personal or cultural identity from an insider鈥檚 perspective; and artists who are concerned with the visibility of photography鈥檚 own histories, as well as its relationship to other visual disciplines. Each represents a different kind of engagement with the contemporary, offering a distinctive critical reflection on the condition of culture at the present moment.

Every artist is represented by a new or recent body of work, and we鈥檝e also commissioned accompanying texts on each artist鈥檚 work by peer writers, which appear on the following pages.