DE-celerate at Te Tuhi Pakuranga : 05 September 2020 — 29 November 2020. The exhibition DE-celerate attempts to capture the fluctuations in artists’ thinking at the time of a worldwide pandemic. The basic human ability to adapt for survival meets the hope that better times may emerge from uncertainty.NOTE : During Level 2 we couldnot activate this project. During Level 1 this is an area for free exchange.

You are welcome to bring or take anything you can carry.

The Waitara Project will launch on Saturday 10 October with the artist in residence for the day. Clark’s activation is a restaging of the hokohoko (bartering) activities that started in the 1980s as the Poverty Shop, later named the Waitara Project Community shop. Clark says, “The Project questions consumerism and undermines the present economic system of profit, waste and exploitation, and so does its extension at Te Tuhi: an area for free, non-monetary exchange. The seed items for the exchange area come from Waitara. They carry with them the history of the project and of Waitara itself.

“The Community Shop was not operating during the lockdown, but our community was. We phoned to check on each other, and we made sure that everyone was looked after. The Waitara Project was briefly disrupted by the pandemic, but the environmental, climate and social injustices that it was founded to counter continue, and so does our work.”

Visitors are invited to take something and leave something at the hokohoko station set up in the foyer of Te Tuhi. This Saturday, we are lucky to have Fiona Clark present for the day, to engage with visitors and discuss the project.

The Waitara Project is part of our current group exhibition DE-celerate, and the exchange will continue until the exhibition closes on 29 November. Te Tuhi is open daily 9am–5pm.