Q1: This book is linked to a comprehensive survey of Mark Adams’ work at the Auckland Art Gallery. Not every living artist gets a survey. Why does Mark so deserve one?
A survey provides an incredible opportunity to examine works from across an artist’s career. In Mark’s case, he has been practising as an artist for over 50 years so the exhibition and publication can draw from five decades of work. Although Mark has an extensive exhibition history, few of these exhibitions included photographs from across multiple bodies of work. They have usually been focused on a single series. It’s challenging to make a truly comprehensive exhibition given the scale of many of Mark’s works – some measure over 11 metres in length – and I wish we could have included even more of them in the exhibition. Thankfully, the book enables us to include a more generous selection of photographs, and in this way it both complements and extends the exhibition.
Q2: Did the fact that his work falls into some fairly distinctive periods and bodies of work help curate the show and organise the book?
Not really. Of course, when there are distinct bodies of work it made sense to follow this into the exhibition and book, for example: Tatau, Cook’s Sites and the photograms. However, what I’ve come to appreciate is that Mark was working on many of bodies of work simultaneously rather than one after another. Bodies of work and lines of enquiry can span and interconnect across decades in Mark’s practice. He isn’t quick to move onto the next thing – the opposite is the case: he will return to a subject again and again over years. I find this fascinating and it affects how you view his work when you’re curating an exhibition and making a book.
Q3: You and Mark would have had many conversations about what should be included. What were you both looking for as you drove towards the final selection?
Yes. We naturally approach the task from different perspectives. Although I have worked hard to view as much as possible, I can’t possibly have the same depth of knowledge of Mark’s work as he does. We have kept in mind a broad public audience who will experience the exhibition and the book – from people who may have never seen Mark’s work before to those who have been avidly following it for years. Hopefully we’ve struck the right balance of major works and material that has scarcely – if ever – been seen in public before. Mark has worked on a number of publications, but this is the first that is focused entirely on his photographic practice and spanning his entire career.
Q4: You will have immersed yourself thoroughly in his practice. What strikes you about him as an artist?
While Mark is himself a man of few words, his photographs speak volumes. Across a career spanning more than 50 years he has photographed Aotearoa New Zealand – its land, people and its complex, multilayered histories. His work feels very timely to consider right now as Aotearoa debates the proposed Treaty Principles Bill and New Zealand histories are being incorporated into school curriculum.
Q5: He has always been early into considerations of what it is to be Pākehā and an artist’s obligations and responsibilities to an authentic relationship with both mana whenua and Pacific peoples. Do you admire that?
Ten years ago Megan Tamati-Quennell, one of Aotearoa’s leading curators of Māori art, observed: ‘[Mark Adams] is one of only a few New Zealand artists, I think, who has really analysed his position as a member of the settler culture and contemplates in his work the settler cultures evolving relationship with the indigenous Māori culture of New Zealand. It is from this considered position that he makes his work.’
Mark has consistently demonstrated a commitment to acknowledging and respecting Indigenous kaupapa and cultural practices. Yes, of course, I admire that. That said, I’m sure Mark wouldn’t want to be positioned as a role model for others to follow. None of us is perfect and we need to forge our own path.
You could say that, in many respects, Mark has been ahead of his time as a Pākehā and Palagi artist. But what does that really mean – to be ‘early’ or ‘ahead of one’s time’? It’s all relative and I’m sure many people would view a respectful approach to tangata whenua and tangata o le moana as seriously overdue.
Q6: As someone schooled in the world of museology has his outsider view given you pause?
Yes. His photographs of museums and art galleries remind me of the artifice and stagecraft that we are actively involved in as curators and museum professionals. Every decision we make communicates something to audiences. We construct meaning through the selection of objects (even those that are absent), their placement, and their interpretation. Mark’s photographs remind me of the power dynamics and knowledge systems that are inscribed in museum, library and art gallery experiences – even embedded into the design of the buildings themselves. A great example of this is Mark’s panorama of the science-fiction-like modernist design of Berlin’s Staatsbibliothek, which feels so at odds with the fact it’s the home of the journals of Georg Forster, the naturalist who travelled with James Cook on his second voyage. Perhaps they have more in common than we might think, however, as we’re still journeying to so-called new frontiers of space. It’s appropriate that these things should give us pause – that helps us to think critically about the information we receive. A vital 21st century skill.
Q7: Is there an image or sequence of images that you keep coming back to, and why?
This is a hard question for me to answer. There are many photographs that I return to. Mark creates complex images. I’ll often find myself veering off down a new line of research to find out more about a subject. Engaging with his work is more than a purely aesthetic experience for me. He makes beautiful and technically accomplished photographs to be sure, but I love learning about the sites, the subjects and the stories associated with his images. That aspect of the work is never finished, and it is part of the photographs’ enduring appeal.
Q8: What have you learned from working with Mark?
It has been a powerful reminder to me of the incredible value of long-term, mutually beneficial and collaborative relationships. It’s important for most, if not all, of us to have intellectual and creative sparring partners who extend and challenge our own thinking.
Q9: His use of old technologies is a standout aspect of his practice. What does it bring to the work do you think?
Mark’s photographs are technically very accomplished. Many photographers I know are mad keen on his work – they geek out at his mastery of the large format. Mark is a self-confessed perfectionist and the level of detail his photographs contain is remarkable. That said, the late Ron Brownson, former Senior Curator, New Zealand Art at Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tāmaki, always stressed to me that Mark was a ‘conceptual photographer’. Following this logic, his choice of a large format, nineteenth-century field camera is as much a conceptual statement as it is a technical preference. As Mark himself has said over the years, he is trying to be ‘the Burton Brothers in reverse’ – to use the same camera to different ends from his nineteenth-century New Zealand photographic counterparts.
Q10: If you could have just five words to describe his body of work what would they be?
Grounded. Considered. Complex. Enduring. Aotearoa.
