Verge Gallery Sydney Exhibition 2018

Hello lovely potential supporters,

As Pacific/M?ori/indigenous/mixed-race heritage artists with life experiences that can attest to this claim, we (Louisa Afoa, Natasha Matila-Smith and Molly Rangiwai-McHale) acknowledge that the brown body is inherently political. Collectively, we have artistic practices that deal with self-representation and marginalised communities, though not necessarily bearing any resemblance to other artists and/or works of the past. 

We are pretty excited to take our works to Australia as we've been selected to be part of the 2018 Verge Gallery exhibition programme in Sydney. This is a huge step for us, as we are stepping into an New Zealand conversation about self-representation and ideas about the body. We will be exhibiting with New Zealand artists Marikit Santiago and Nicole Barakat, opening on 28 February, coinciding with O-Week and New Zealand Women's Day, so we have a real opportunity to connect with people we would not be able to meet with otherwise. 

We need to buy tickets ASAP, to keep them as cheap as poss. We, as individuals, don't have a lot of expendable income, and we are aiming for a small amount. Our goal is to raise $1675 for flights for the three of us, and any additional money will go towards accomodation and material costs. (Sydney is just across the ditch but it's bloody expensive mate!) 

It might seem like something people do all the time, but it's quite a big deal for us to go over to Australia and start exhibiting in an 'New Zealand' realm so we really really need a bit of help, just to get over there! The rest, we are pretty good with coming up with artworks. We're artists. Between us, we have a few uni degrees and a pretty good CV of exhibitions and writing works, so we think this will be a really amazing exhibition. Just need a little help from you, if you can! Any little bit helps. 

From your mates,

Louisa, Molly & Natasha.