Inside Out Project in New Zealand

Last night when I was putting some more things on this blog, an awesome picture came up on my newsfeed on facebook, and it totally relates to what this research blog is all about.

It is quite close to home as well, because it stems out of the Christchurch earthquakes. I have family and friends down there who were hugely affected. Things are still being rebuilt, and people are trying to move on with life as best they can.

This picture is really striking.

Inside Out Project-New Zealand crew. Pictures of kids from Christchurch-their school is being closed down after the earthquakes. (photo from Inside Out Project facebook page)

This is what it said on facebook, along with the image.

“This group project is from Christchurch, New Zealand. These children lost their school to a series of earthquakes and are fighting for their community to help them rebuild since their government is refusing to provide the proper funding.”

So I found out more about what the ‘Inside Out Project‘ is… I took this text from the description of themselves on facebook:

It is a large-scale participatory art project that transforms messages of personal identity into pieces of artistic work.

Everyone is challenged to use black and white photographic portraits to discover, reveal and share the untold stories and images of people around the world. These digitally uploaded images will be made into posters and sent back to the project’s co-creators for them to exhibit in their own communities.

This shows people getting out there, caring for their communities. Not just talking about change, but making it happen.

 

The Cut Collective

Cut Collective consists of five like-minded people, all from different backgrounds in art. They are based in Auckland, New Zealand.

The Street art – Oi YOU! Website describes them like this:

The members all produce very distinctive imagery, which incorporates elements from popular culture, graphic design, local history and contemporary political issues.

Cut Collective’s practice ranges from commissioned artworks to gallery exhibitions, public murals, commercial design and illustration and apparel.

Picture perfect in a world of chaos- Public access 5, by the Cut Collective. (photos from Cut Collectives facebook page)

One of their exhibitions that really caught my eye was Public Access 5 – Picture perfect in a world of chaos. It happened a few years ago now. But the content is still relevant to things that are going on around the world now. Some peoples fairytale stories (or how they’re portrayed to us in the media anyway) couldn’t be further from the reality of the hardship of others in the world.

On one side of the artwork is a scene that you’d imagine in a fairytale, Full of bright colour, with Prince William, his bride Kate Middleton, Bambi & the a few of the 7 dwarfs. On the other side, the complete opposite – a dark war scene. Some of the 7 dwarfs are a lot worse off in this scenario.

It also made me think about how one picture shows only a second, even less, in time. There is so much more beyond the ‘picture perfect.’ And do we choose to stay in our fantasy worlds, or push further through to where we can be part of the change?

Picture perfect in a world of chaos, Public Access 5, the Cut Collective (photo from cut collective facebook page)

On the Cut Collective website it says this about the artwork:

Working around the central theme of “Picture Perfect in a World of Chaos”, this show deals with the representation of a world that is a palpable fantasy, and looks to explore the ridiculous nature of the variant realities we receive through multiple media channels. Something we here at CC have come to call “The Gap”

Read more about this exhibition and check out more pics here.

Picture perfect in a world of chaos, Public access 5, by the Cut Collective (photo from cut collective facebook page)

Political posters by New Zealand street artist ‘Toothfish’

Anti-capitalist posters by a New Zealand street artist have popped up in 35 countries around the world.

He goes by the name Toothfish and says like the endangered species he’d prefer to remain inconspicuous to save himself from mankind.

“Art itself is either undervalued or overvalued,” he says. “The value systems on this planet seem skewed and wrong and Toothfish is using art to attack some of these value systems.”

Toothfish is an eco-artist and international poster project who raises awareness of environmental/political issues by producing posters which are distributed internationally in both the real and virtual worlds.

Read more & see a video interview with Toothfish here. Above picture by Toothfish & sourced from here.