This exhibition is now closed
Reconstruction: Conversations on a City
23 June –
14 October 2012
Louise Henderson Manchester Street, Christchurch (detail) 1929. Oil on board. Dame Louise Henderson Collection, presented by the McKegg Family 1999. Reproduced with permission
In acknowledging architectural heritage loss in this city's present and past, this visually rich outdoor exhibition unfolds the ways in which dreams and values have been given form in our built environment.
Tracking the story of Christchurch / Otautahi from its earliest years, Reconstruction gathers together a fascinating selection of digitised drawings, photographs, paintings, maps and plans to provide a compelling visual account of how this place came to be. In examining foundations, it also acknowledges loss and, in reconstructing aspects of this city's past, it demonstrates how different dreams and values have been given form in our built environment. Contributions from a range of thoughtful commentators raise questions: can this city be rebuilt as a place of genuine quality and interest if it undervalues the significance of its rich architectural heritage past?
Reconstruction: Conversations on a City is one of the first in a range of Christchurch City Council transitional city projects to be installed within Christchurch's Central City.
My Gallery
Curator:
Ken Hall
Exhibition number: 902
Presented by
Part of
Exhibition Supporter
Related
film
ARCHITECTS: WORKS AND HUMANITARIAN ACTIVITIES
Listen to renowned Japanese architect Shigeru Ban present ARCHITECTS: WORKS AND HUMANITARIAN ACTIVITIES on Sunday, 22 April 2012, at the CPIT DL Theatre. Shigeru Ban talks about his works, including natural disaster relief projects, and presents his design for the Cardboard Cathedral, the temporary home of the ChristChurch Cathedral.
ARCHITECTS: WORKS AND HUMANITARIAN ACTIVITIES was the second talk in the Re:actions for the city public programme which focused on the challenges and opportunities currently facing Christchurch, including temporary and portable architecture, urbanism, heritage and revitalization.
film
Christchurch Traffic Development
A short film made by Peter Noonan while undertaking post graduate studies in Moving Image at the University of Canterbury School of Fine Arts in 1966.
Narrator: Leonard Trindall
Music: 'Murder She Says' by Ron Goodwin
Exhibition
Hidden Light: Early Canterbury and West Coast Photography
2 February – 25 August 2019
Uncovering the remarkable, largely unseen work of early New Zealand photographers.
Exhibition
Tjalling is Innocent
21 August – 29 October 2012
An ambitious paste-up work by local artist Tjalling de Vries on CoCa's back wall (viewable from Worcester Boulevard), Tjalling is Innocent is an Outer Spaces project presented in association with CoCA.
Exhibition
Phantom City: Doc Ross's Christchurch 1998-2011
14 July – 1 November 2012
Back projected large onto a shop window in Colombo Street, Sydenham, Doc Ross's photographs create a haunting record of this city before its dramatic seismic demise.
Commentary
Bringing the Soul
As an eleven-year-old boy from Whāngarei, sent to live in Yaldhurst with my aunt in the late seventies, Christchurch was a culture shock. Arriving in New Zealand’s quintessential ‘English city’, I remember well the wide landscapes and manicured colonial built environment. It was very pretty but also very monocultural, with no physical evidence of current or former Māori occupation or cultural presence, or at least none that I could appreciate at that time.
Notes
Shandy anyone?
It's pretty certainly the oldest shop in Christchurch. Although to be fair there's not really much competition for that title any more...
Notes
Nosferatwho?
For me, the best bits in vintage photographs are often the bits the photographer didn't really mean to capture.
Notes
Heritage is still worth something
Christchurch Art Gallery Te Puna o Waiwhetū won a Civic Trust Award last night for the outdoor exhibition Reconstruction: conversations on a city. The exhibition on Worcester Boulevard closes this Sunday - the Reconstruction publication will be available within the next few days...
Notes
Worcester Boulevard exhibition extended as publication developed
The popularity of Reconstruction: Conversations on a City has led to the exhibition being extended until 14 October, and the development of a publication.
Notes
X marks the spot
A word that has been bandied about in and out of Christchurch, left, right and centre post February 22 is Resilience, a word that has little impact now whenever I hear it mentioned in relation to the earthquakes.
Notes
Doc Ross: Phantom City
Wait 'til night comes and park up your car outside 464 Colombo Street in the new Sydenham. The neighbourhood is quiet, no late night shopping here – there seems nothing of that sort likely to turn up here for a fair while yet.
Notes
Reproductive cycle
We are receiving quite a few requests for reproductions of the works in our Reconstruction exhibition.
Notes
After midnight...
'We're gonna give an exhibition.
We're gonna find out what it is all about.'
JJ Cale got it about right.
Notes
Christchurch in the Mist
Not even dark, cold, grey weather on Sunday could deter the citizens of Christchurch coming out to hear art historian John Wilson as he walked and talked among the magnificent Reconstruction panels on Worcester Boulevard.
Notes
Reconstruction construction
The exhibition opens on Worcester Boulevard on Saturday morning. So our exhibitions team, with assistance from Scenic Solutions, has been hard at work building the display stands over the past few days.
Notes
Christchurch 1850
A carefully drawn plan on a sheet of paper: it's interesting to reflect that most cities didn't exist in this form before a single street had been formed, or hardly a building raised.
Notes
Architectural renderings
It's difficult not to have one's head filled with buildings right now – and not just because we're working on the edges of the broken town.
Notes
Christchurch Cathedral in 1878...
...feels remarkably close to Christchurch Cathedral at this present moment. I have no idea of what the lesson is here, but there surely is one. Any suggestions?
Notes
Doc Ross: photographing the red zone
Sydenham-based photographer Doc Ross and his camera have been investigating the Christchurch urban environment for the past 14 years.
Notes
Five years on
Today is the fifth anniversary of the February earthquake of 2011 which devastated Christchurch. During that time, we and our city have been through so many different phases.
Notes
The regeneration must not be bureaucratised
Aaron Kreisler is Head of the School of Fine Art at the University of Canterbury. He talked to Bulletin about challenges and opportunities for the arts in our city and what art can contribute to the future of Christchurch.
Notes
What sort of city do we want our children's children to live in?
Martin Trusttum, project manager for Ōtākaro Art by the River, and founder of temporary gallery space ArtBox, writes on the role of art in Christchurch.
Notes
Repair Update - Base Isolation to begin
A technology that allows a building to effectively 'float' on its foundations during an earthquake is about to be applied to the Gallery.
Notes
Earthquake Momento
The latest issue of Photoforum's MoMento journal (issue 14, January 2014) focuses on the work of three photographers with strong ties to Christchurch and their haunting images of this battered city post February 22, 2011.
Notes
Earthquake generosity
We recently received this generous gift - from one quakeprone country to another
Notes
New Gallery programmes consider a city in transition
The possibilities for a city in transition will be considered in Re:actions for the city – a new series of public events that we are launching.
Notes
The Boulevard of Broken Art
Well before the earthquakes, Christchurch had a reputation as a tough town for public art. The city's public spaces are haunted by the ghosts of several major sculptures that never made it to completion. And several local sculptors still carry some psychological scar tissue from their forays into the public realm.
Notes
A major boon to the Gallery in the direct aftermath of the earthquake
English artist Sarah Lucas was installing her show in Two Rooms, Auckland, when the 22 February earthquake struck.