Waitaha Canterbury contains nearly sixty-four percent of the braided rivers found in Aotearoa New Zealand. Their dynamics are still being understood, but what is clear is that the visible course of a braided river is only one element of its entirety.

Wesley John Fourie, based in Ōtepoti Dunedin, works across multiple media, including ceramics, video, photography and textiles. One element of Fourie’s practice is the production of hand-knitted scale models of rivers, including Te Awa Tupua Whanganui River and the Murray River in Australia. Here, a series of works explore ideas of love, labour, the natural world, spirituality and time.

The central work, the first day of my life as a braided river, is a total of 2100 metres of finger knitting that mimics at 1/100 scale the branches of Whakatere Ashburton river. The entanglement of yarn is a visual analogy for the river’s multiple channels of water. Made over three years, and existing in three-dimensions, the work is an accumulation of time – in the labour involved in working the yarn – that reflects the life of a river at human scale.

For Fourie, the natural environment is the object of amorous affection, and the source of spiritual nourishment. The words of the poem from which the exhibition takes its title are woven into and embedded within the works themselves. They address an unseen lover, and the act of becoming the water and minerals shared within bodies human and riverine.

Join us for the opening of this exhibition on Saturday 14 December at 6pm. This will coincide with the opening of Michael Greaves’ exhibition Falling If Not Flying. 

Catalogue

Main Image | Wesley John Fourie, the first day of my life as a braided river (detail), 2021-2024, 2100m of knitting, mixed media.