Panel Discussion: Artist Orbits
Sunday 18 August, 10.30am – 12pm
Join us at 10:30am for coffee and pastries supplied by our local Crafty Baker before the panel discussion which starts at 11am.
The discussion will unpack artist orbits within the Chartwell Collection, spotlighting the practices of John Nixon and Julian Dashper who are the most deeply collected artists in the Collection. The shared ideologies and connections of these artists across Aotearoa and Australia resulted in numerous collaborations, most notably their record label CIRCLE RECORDS (1996–2002). The exhibition’s title ‘MILKSTARS’ references the name of their first collaborative record MILKSTAR (1996).
The relationship between these artists can be thought of as a nucleus—one of many artist nuclei—around which other artists and communities are figured in orbit like emanating vibrations of sound. The panel includes Sue Cramer (curator, writer and manager of the John Nixon Estate), Marie Shannon (artist and manager of the Julian Dashper Estate), and Sue Gardiner (writer and co-Director of the Chartwell Collection), and will be moderated by Te Uru Curator James Gatt.
Sue Cramer is an independent curator and writer based in Naarm Melbourne who has previously held curatorial positions in several Australian art museums and galleries, including Heide Museum of Modern Art, Naarm Melbourne, and the Museum of Contemporary Art, Gadigal Nura Sydney. Since August 2020, Sue has been the Director of her late husband John Nixon’s Estate, and has curated several exhibitions of his work. She was also a founding member of Nixon’s experimental noise music band The Donkey’s Tail and performed alongside Nixon as part of The Donkey’s Tail Klang Theatre.
Recent projects include Hilma af Klint: The Secret Paintings, curated for the Art Gallery of New South Wales and City Gallery Wellington Te Whare Toi, 2021–22, and John Nixon—Four Decades, Five Hundred Prints, co-curated with Emma Nixon and Trent Walter for Geelong Gallery, Victoria in 2023.
Marie Shannon is an artist based in Tāmaki Makaurau, working in the mediums of photography, video and drawing. She has exhibited extensively in Aotearoa and internationally over the last 35 years, and her work is held in numerous public and private collections. She is a trustee of the Julian Dashper Estate and caretaker of the artist’s extensive archive.
Sue Gardiner (MNZM) is the Chair of the Chartwell Charitable Trust, an Aotearoa New Zealand philanthropic trust founded by her father in 1974 to support the visual arts and deepen knowledge about the creative process. Sue is also co-Director of the Chartwell Collection, a major public collection of New Zealand and Australian contemporary art held on long-term loan at Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tāmaki, which celebrates its 50th Anniversary this year. Sue is well-known for publicly supporting initiatives that expand arts access and education, arts governance, and promoting art through national and international art tours.
18 August, 10:30 am-12pm