Abstract:
The sculptural installation was exhibited at the 54th Venice Biennale in the Palazzo Loredan dell'Ambasciatore on the Grand Canal. The exhibition title is based on the poem "On First Looking into Chapman’s Homer" by the nineteenth-century English Romantic poet John Keats. In this, Keats describes a Spanish adventurer climbing to the top of a hill in what is now Panama and looking out over the Pacific to survey its potential riches for the first time. The works included one intricately-carved red Steinway concert grand piano and two concert grands fabricated in bronze supporting two cast bronze bulls. On one piano a full-size bull rested on the closed lid with its massive body suggesting the folding forms of landscape. On the other piano the bull stood firm, offering an eye-to-eye challenge for anyone prepared to take a seat at the keyboard. The installation also featured a figure from the Kapa Haka series (Officer Taumaha), two small bronze olive tree saplings (Constitution Hill), and one pair of child-sized bronze crocs. The titles of the works that make up the installation are: He Korero Purakau mo Te Awanui o Te Motu: story of a New Zealand river (the carved piano), A Peak in Darien (the resting bull and piano), and Chapman’s Homer (the standing bull and piano). He Korero Purakau mo Te Awanui o Te Motu Story of a New Zealand River was played throughout the exhibition with a programme of performances by New Zealand and Italian pianists.