Project Abstract
The changes wrought on Ōtautahi Christchurch’s urban environment by the recent earthquakes have had a direct impact on the way in which the material culture of the city is encountered by residents and visitors, and on how art is produced and displayed. As both a disaster and a juncture for opportunity, the sudden transformation of Christchurch has required both processes of commemoration, and the need to identify and enact the future direction of the city. This project seeks to draw together a number of perspectives that consider Christchurch’s art and material culture in the context of this altered – and altering – environment, wherein boundaries between the public and the private, the political and the personal, and the natural and the manmade are ambiguous or in flux. The contingent and provisional nature of life around the rebuild necessitates the convergence of spheres sometimes treated as distinct – art; landscape; social relations; logistics – inviting an interdisciplinary treatment of these issues, referencing a diverse range of theoretical approaches and modes of interpretation.
