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Christine Webster

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Christine Webster
Born1958 (age 65–66)
Pukekohe, Auckland
NationalityNew Zealander
EducationMassey University, Glasgow School of Art
Known forPhotography

Christine Webster (born 1958) is a New Zealand visual artist and photographer.

Background[edit]

Webster was born in 1958 in Pukekohe, Auckland.[1] She currently lives in the United Kingdom.[2]

Webster has a Diploma in Photography from Massey University[3] and an MFA from Glasgow School of Art.[2] Webster has taught at the ASA School of Art, Auckland, Unitec Institute of Technology, and Elam School of Fine Art, and currently is a senior lecturer at the Cambridge School of Art.[2]

Career[edit]

Webster is a photographer and visual artist. Her work explores society's accepted boundaries and the human psyche, specifically relating to gender and identity.[2][4] In the early eighties women photographers like Christine Webster took up a post modern position creating images as opposed to making a documentary record of the world around them. In doing this they introduced a more conceptual and theatrical approach that would previously been considered unthinkable.[5] Webster started using her own body and that of friends to act out the characters in her work. A friend, and professional magician, Tim Woon[6] appears as an over eager corporate suit, briefcase and alarm clock at the ready. In another image the briefcase opens to a magician’s flash of fire. Later dancer and choreographer Douglas Wright would appear in many of Webster’s photographs in many different guises. As Bridget Sullivan pointed out in the catalogue for the group show alter / image, by using a reference to  ‘glossy up market  advertising stills’, Webster manages to’ upset ideas of male control and gravity’.[7]

Working in series[edit]

Almost from the beginning of her career as an art photographer Webster tended to work in series presenting groups of photographs as a cohesive collection. These series have included:

1980s

  • New Myths. These early works often featured Webster herself, both as subject and photographer. Anna Smith writing about this series described them as, “not so much daring or prurient, as jubilatory, flaming with life.”[8] 

1991

  • The Players

1991-1998

  • Black Carnival While resident as the 1991 Frances Hodgkins Fellow in Dunedin Webster began visualising what would become one of her major series Black Carnival. When complete it would be a sequence of sixty images. Using models Webster challenged norms of the day by exploring ideas around feminism and gender roles, the shiny surfaces of the photographs incorporating the viewers into a personal conversation with the content via their mirrored image.[9] The works were inspired by ancient wall paintings like those of the Villa of the Mysteries in Rome, Webster creating her own ‘frieze of human abandonment and decadence.’[10] In 1993 the Dunedin Public Art Gallery commissioned a 49 sheet version of  Black Carnival that is now in the gallery’s collection and one of the largest photographic installations in the country.[11] The series features a number of naked figures did not pass unnoticed. As writer Ewan McDonald commented, the exhibition contained content and ambiguities “ we often dare not admit to…”[12] An example is the naked photograph of the cabaret artist Mika who stands straight on and stares directly into the camera.[13] At nearly two and a half meters high the impact as noted by art writer Erin Harrington, ‘demands attention.’[14] When Black Carnival (including the Mika portrait) toured to Hamilton a city councillor, Russ Rimmington, called the exhibition pornographic and called for its closure. “I’ve got a mind as broad as a Roman sewer, but this is just sleaze – it’s worse than pornographic magazines like Playboy or Cleo.[15] the exhibition went on with all works included.[16]

1996  

  • Circus of Angels.  A collaboration between Webster and choreographer and dancer Douglas Wright who is the model in all the photos.  Webster had already worked with Wright previously on his dance Buried Venus.’ [17] In a prescient interview recorded before their meeting  and collaboration Wright described an image that could only come from Webster’s studio, ‘I feel there has to be the image of a woman, or else something that is neither man nor woman. We need something that is mysterious and layered and rich. It needs to read well from a distance.”[18]

Other series include Doll’s House (2000), Quiet (2013) and Therapies[19] (2014). 

Awards[edit]

In 1991 Webster was awarded the Frances Hodgkins Fellowship.[20]

She has received a Queen Elizabeth II Arts Council Grant (1988), Polaroid Small Projects Grant (1989).[2]

Collections[edit]

Her work is held in the following collections:

Exhibitions[edit]

  • 2015, Truth + Fiction, Trish Clark Gallery, Auckland (group show)[24]
  • 2016, The XX Factor, Trish Clark Gallery, Auckland (group show)[25]

References[edit]

  1. ^ "Christine Webster". findnzartists.org.nz. Retrieved 11 December 2017.
  2. ^ a b c d e "Christine Webster". nz-artists.co.nz. Retrieved 11 December 2017.
  3. ^ "Christine Webster CV". www.christinewebster.co.uk. Retrieved 11 December 2017.
  4. ^ "Christine Webster". Trish Clark Gallery. Retrieved 11 December 2017.
  5. ^ Ireland, Peter. "Photography - New directions, 1970s to 2000s". Te Ara - the Encyclopedia of New Zealand. Retrieved 5 June 2024.
  6. ^ Jones, Nicholas (6 March 2011). "Auckland Arts Festival: Magician Still Draws Crowds in Internet Age". The New Zealand Herald. Retrieved 5 June 2024.
  7. ^ Barton, Christina; Lawler-Dormer, Deborah; Wellington City Art Gallery (Wellington, N.Z.); Auckland City Art Gallery, eds. (1993). Alter/image: feminism and representation in New Zealand art, 1973-1993. Wellington, N.Z. : Auckland, N.Z: City Gallery, Wellington, Wellington City Council ; Auckland City Art Gallery, Auckland City Council. p. 57. ISBN 978-0-908818-14-3.
  8. ^ Smith, Anna (Winter 2010). "Dead Can't Dance: The Provocations of Christine Webster". Art New Zealand (134).
  9. ^ McAloon, William; Museum of New Zealand, eds. (2009). Art at Te Papa. Wellington, N.Z: Te Papa Press. p. 380. ISBN 978-1-877385-38-4. OCLC 181354783.
  10. ^ "Christine Webster: Black Carnival" (PDF). Robert McDougall Art Gallery Bulletin (95): 3. April 1995.
  11. ^ Notman, Robyn; Cullen, Lynda (2009). Beloved: works from the Dunedin Public Art Gallery [exhibition, Dunedin public art gallery, 12 December 2009 - October 2011]. Dunedin, N.Z: Dunedin Public Art Gallery. pp. 228–229. ISBN 978-0-908910-58-8.
  12. ^ McDonald, Ewan (Spring 1993). "Process, Procession, Possession: Christine Webster's Black Carnival". Art New Zealand (68).
  13. ^ "Christine Webster: Mika Kai Tahu". Retrieved 5 June 2024.
  14. ^ Harrington, Erin (Autumn 2015). "(In) Decent Exposure". Bulletin of the Christchurch Art Gallery (183): 35–41.
  15. ^ "Erotic art exhibit already under fire". Waikato Times. 22 July 1994.
  16. ^ "Controversial show goes on". Otago Daily Times. 27 July 1994.
  17. ^ Gibson, Sarah (1997). "Circus of Angels: Recent Work by Christine Webster". Art New Zealand (83): 50–53.
  18. ^ "Raewyn Whyte An Interview with Douglas Wright". Landfall (191): 37–49. Autumn 1996.
  19. ^ Seja, Nina (2014). "Refuge & Ritual Trust: Christine Webster's Therapies". Art New Zealand (150).
  20. ^ "The Frances Hodgkins Fellowship". University of Otago. Retrieved 11 December 2017.
  21. ^ "Christine Webster". Retrieved 5 June 2024.
  22. ^ "Christine Webster". Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa. Retrieved 11 December 2017.
  23. ^ "Christine Webster". Auckland Art Gallery. Retrieved 11 December 2017.
  24. ^ "Truth + Fiction". Trish Clark Gallery. Retrieved 11 December 2017.
  25. ^ "The XX Factor". Trish Clark Gallery. Retrieved 11 December 2017.

External links[edit]

Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Christine_Webster&oldid=1227501522"