LORENE TAUREREWA

sheet: 1117 x 1527 mm

1123 x 1509 mm

sheet: 1288 x 1530 mm

Tafelspiele 1 (2011) charcoal on paper, sheet: 1520 x 1111 mm

Wogengroupe 1 (2013)

graphite on rice paper, frame: 632 x 505 x 31 mm, image: 240 x 245 mm

Wogengroupe 2 (2013)

graphite on rice paper, frame: 632 x 505 x 31 mm, image: 240 x 245 mm

Wogengroupe 3 (2013)

graphite on rice paper, frame: 632 x 505 x 31 mm, image: 223 x 232 mm

Wogengroupe 4 (2013)

graphite on rice paper, frame: 632 x 505 x 31 mm, image: 223 x 232 mm

Wogengroupe 5 (2013)

graphite on rice paper, frame: 632 x 505 x 31 mm, image: 240 x 245 mm

A palpable sense of unease permeates the works in New York-based artist Lorene Taurerewa’s new exhibition Tafelspiele. Her moody charcoal and pencil drawings suggest the unnerving figures that haunt our dreams, lurking just beneath the surface of our consciousness.

German for ‘table play’ or ‘table games’, the title of the show alludes in one sense to the tradition of memento mori : here “a tabletop is a certain model for a certain idea of life on this world: life on the flat-earth plane, without refuge, rimmed by oblivion (1). Ina similar vein, the monumental scale and feel of the Tafelspiele charcoals, evoke a sense of a theatre outside time; sculptural, disembodied heads watch over tableaux where secondary players sometimes act out their lonely plays.

The series of Wogengroupe pencil drawings on rice paper draw in viewers with their delicate intimacy and then unsettle with their theatre of carnivalesque characters. Allegorical in tone, a number of the works feature the Golliwog, or Huggermugger, who may be read as “the embodiment of creative, disruptive wit… Like the Pans, Lokis or Mauis of mythology, he is one who lays himself down - literally and figuratively in these works - to give room for Truth.” (2) Taurerewa’s visual narratives act as a starting point from which viewers must draw their own truths, coloured by the anxieties of their own subconscious and formed by the stories of their own lives.

Taurerewa’s drawings have their parallels in the dark fairy tales that served to illustrate fears of the unknown and the unspeakable. The artist gives form to the anxieties that lurk in the dark corners of the psyche, confronting viewers with dreamscapes that seem at once strange and eerily familiar.

1. Eoghan MacDaibheid, “The Dealer’s Hand: Traditions of Representation in Drawings by Lorene Taurerewa 2008 – 2010”, Art Monthly Australia, December 2011

2. Beth Fiore, Huggermugger Exhibition Text, The Gallery, New York, October 2012.

EXHIBITION PRICELIST

1 - 5 Tafelspiele 1 - 5 (2011/13) 4,500 each unframed*

6 - 10 Wogengroupe 1 - 5 (2013) 1,450 each framed

*Framing estimates available on request

All prices are NZD and include GST; Prices are current at the time of the exhibition

LORENE TAUREREWA

lives New York, USA

TheStrongMustLeadtheWeak(2008)

“Taurerewa shifts scales and frames the way Shakespeare would set a play within a play, to structure different layers of fiction and thereby invert the relationships of cause and effect... These are not layers to be separated, rather roots hopelessly knotted, tangled from trying to grow in the inhospitable soil of our era, or perhaps of our human nature.” (1)

Tokoroa-born and New York-based, Taurerewa works in a range of media including charcoal, watercolours and oils. Her works tap into a world of the subconscious and raise many more questions than answers. Figures suggestive of freak show or circus escapees populate her drawn and painted worlds, their looming torsos creating a palpable sense of apprehension and unease.

‘Unnerved’, a group show at Brisbane’s Gallery of Modern Art in 2010 featured drawings from Taurerewa’s ‘Psychopompe’ series alongside works from Anne Noble, Michael Parekowhai and Lisa Reihana. Curator Maud Page described Taurerewa’s drawings as “Dark and otherworldly… [appearing] to exist outside time, emerging instead as the not-quite-controllable creations of psychological realms.” (2) The set of 20 drawings were subsequently acquired by the Queensland Art Gallery for its permanent collection.

Taurerewa held a permanent position as Lecturer in Drawing in the School of Design at the Victoria University of Wellington from 2000-2009 and has featured in a regular schedule of national and international exhibitions throughout the last decade.

(1) McLeod,Warwick,‘TheDealer’sHand:TraditionsofRepresentationinDrawingsbyLoreneTaurerewa2008-2010’,Art MonthlyAustralia,Issue248,April2012,p34

(2) Page,Maud,“Unnerved:Curator’sEssay”for“Unnerved:TheNewZealandProject”,GalleryofModernArt,Brisbane,1 May–4July2010.

LoreneTaurerewa2013CV

LORENE TAUREREWA

lives New York, USA

EDUCATION

1996 Bachelor of Fine Art (Painting), Quay School of the Arts, Wanganui

SOLO EXHIBITIONS

2013 Tafelspiele, Milford Galleries Dunedin

2012 Lorene Taurerewa, Thermostat Gallery, Palmerston North

2011 THE END, Artspace, Brooklyn, New York, USA

The Company of Fools, Helen Gory Galerie, Melbourne, Australia

2010 Lorene Taurerewa, Suite Gallery, Wellington

Sleight of Hand, PATAKA Museum of Arts and Cultures, Porirua

Yardmeter Editions, Brooklyn, New York, USA

2009 More Eccentrickery, Chaffers Gallery, Wellington

White Paintings, Oedipus Rex Gallery, Auckland

2008 Eccentriks, A.I.C.H Gallery, New York, USA

Psychopompe, Oedipus Rex Gallery, Auckland

Sensible World, Chaffers Gallery, Wellington

Drawings, NZ Consulate, Santa Monica, Los Angeles, USA

2007 Degrees of Separation, Oedipus Rex Gallery, Auckland

2006 National Museum of Contemporary Art, Changdong Gallery, Seoul, Korea

Lorene Taurerewa Drawing, PATAKA Museum of Arts and Cultures, Porirua

Journey of 1000 Miles, Sarjeant Gallery, Wanganui

Lorene Taurerewa: Here and Now, Fifty2gallery, Wellington

2005 Big Drawings, Lopdell House Gallery, Auckland

2004 Inherited Bodies, PATAKA Museum of Arts and Cultures, Porirua

2002 Body Speak, Neut Gallery, Wellington

GROUP EXHIBITIONS

2013 Large Works, Milford Galleries Dunedin

2012 Mervyn Williams/Chris Bailey/Lorene Taurerewa, Milford Galleries Dunedin

Intraspace Project, Waikato Museum, Hamilton

Fountain Art Fair, New York, USA

NORTHSIDE Art Exhibition, Many Conversations, Brooklyn, New York, USA

Brucennial 2012, New York, USA

Contemplations and Conjectures, Schick Art Gallery, Saratoga, New York, USA

Influential Women, Kentler International Drawing Space, Brooklyn, New York, USA

THE END, The Sugarbread House, Brooklyn, New York, USA

Suit of Skin, Small Works Gallery, Brisbane, Australia

Legends : Obsessions with the Incomprehensible and the Uncanny, La Trobe Regional Gallery, Melbourne, Australia

2011 WANDERLUST, Yes Gallery, Brooklyn, New York, USA

GIMME SOME TRUTH: a Return to Form, In Rivers Gallery, Brooklyn, New York, USA

Figuration Today: the Surrealist Influence, McLean Project for the Arts, Washington DC, USA

Unnerved: The New Zealand Project, National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne, Australia

2010 Unnerved: The New Zealand Project, Gallery of Modern Art, Brisbane, Australia

2009 Chrysalid, Amelia Johnson Gallery, Hong Kong

INSIGHT: Contemporary Approaches to Drawing, Ann Street Gallery, New York, USA

Soul Ideologie, Gallery Korea, Park Ave, New York, USA

Drawing Center Viewing Program, New York, USA

2008 New Zealand Embassy, 3 person show, Paris, France

Samoa Contemporary, PATAKA Museum of Arts and Cultures, Porirua

Samoa Contemporary, Tauranga Public Art Gallery

LoreneTaurerewa2013CV

Milford Galleries Dunedin www.milfordgalleries.co.nz

2007 Essence of Asia: Eastern Influences in Western Art, Asian Fusion Gallery, New York, USA

2004 Wahine Pasifika, Te Wa Gallery, Wanganui

2003 Dolly Mix (W)rappers, PATAKA Museum of Arts and Cultures, Porirua

2002 Summer Show, Te Wa Gallery, Wanganui

2001 Dolly Mix (W)rappers, Waikato Museum of Art and History, Hamilton

2000 Pacific Blue, Sarjeant Gallery, Wanganui

AWARDS

2006 IASK Residency: The National Artists Studio: National Museum of Contemporary Art, Korea Martin Hughes, Contemporary Pacific Art Award, Winner

COLLECTIONS

Queensland Art Gallery | Gallery of Modern Art, Brisbane

National Gallery of Victoria

James Wallace Collection, Auckland

PATAKA Museum of Arts and Cultures, Porirua

Private and public collections in New Zealand, USA, Australia, Europe and Asia

SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY

2011 McLeod, Warwick, The Dealer’s Hand: Traditions of Representation in Drawings by Lorene Taurerewa 2008 - 2011, Art Monthly Australia, November, 2011

2010 Crawford, Ashley, Profile Lorene Taurerewa, Australian Art Collector, October – December 2010, pg 108 - 109

Martin-Chew, Louise, Impressive Kiwi Gothic, Australian Art Review, August 2010

2009 Brown, Warwick, Seen This Century: 100 Contemporary New Zealand Artists, A Collectors Guide, Godwit, Auckland, pg 348 - 349

Lorene Taurerewa in New York, Film documentary for Kete Aronui Arts Program, KIWA Films, Auckland

2008 Greenpoint Gazette, New York, 10 October 2008

McNamara, TJ, Painted Canvas Reflects Better than a Mirror, NZ Herald, 1 May 2008

Cunnane, Abbey, Samoan. Sort of, NZ Listener, 3 May 2008

2007 McNamara, TJ, City and Suburbs, Auckland Herald, 21 April 2007

Misool, Wolgan, Lorene Taurerewa, Korean Arts Monthly Magazine, February 2007, pg 55

2005 Davidson, Owen, Spirit and Form, The Art of Lorene Taurerewa, Art New Zealand, No 117, Summer 2005/2006, pg 58 - 61

Chalmers, Linda, The Arrival of Contemporary Pacific, New Zealand Investor Monthly, March 2005, pg 3

LoreneTaurerewa2013CV