Ashburton Art Gallery is delighted to be hosting Legacies, the 2022 programme of artist cinema commissions from CIRCUIT Artist Moving Image Aotearoa New Zealand.

Legacies features five short films for cinema by Edith Amituanai, Martin Sagadin, Ukrit Sa-nguanhai (Thai), Pati Tyrell, and Sriwhana Spong. Curated by CIRCUIT’s 2022/23 curator-at-large Dr May Adadol Ingawanij (Thai/UK), the project began with a series of prompts Ingawanij sent to the artists about the potential meaning and resonance of the term ‘Legacies’.

“Legacies as: the pre-modern artistic, cultural, linguistic and religious heritages of the place and land that you were born into and raised in; through to the legacies of colonisation, and the spectres of nations and nationalisms; the legacies of the modern art/film histories; the narratives and ways of knowing that shaped you, and that bring an ambivalence and a desire to undo.”

– May Adadol Ingawanij

Each artist was invited by Ingwanij to make a short film which attempted to articulate the artist’s own personal response to the term. The result is a programme of five new artist works which features a portrait of a young Pasifika matriarch; a reflection on the cinematic history of Thailand; an artist sculpting clay in their studio; an animation based on a Balinese painting made by the artist’s grandfather, and a vivid interpretation of Samoan funeral chants and speeches.

CIRCUIT is a non-profit arts agency that supports New Zealand artists working in the moving image.

For more information see circuit.org.nz

Main Image | Martin Sagadin, Garden of Clay, 2022, digital video, sound, 16 min 12 sec. Commissioned by CIRCUIT with the assistance of Creative New Zealand.

Left | Edith Amituanai, Epifania, 2022, digital video, sound, 8 min 30 sec. Commissioned by CIRCUIT with the assistance of Creative New Zealand.