Reuben Paterson

Image Credit: Flaneurshan.studio

Reuben Paterson (b. 1973) is an artist based in New York. He received a BFA from The University of Auckland in 1997 and a Post Graduate Diploma of Teaching from The University of Auckland in 2000.

Paterson has exhibited nationally and internationally since 2000. He has staged recent solo exhibitions at City Gallery Wellington Te Whare Toi (2023), Christchurch Art Gallery Te Puna o Waiwhetū (2022) and The Dowse Art Museum, Lower Hutt (2020), and has featured in significant group exhibitions such as the largest survey of contemporary Māori art, Toi Tū Toi Ora: Contemporary Māori Art at Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tāmaki (2020); Contemporary Asian and Pacific Art, The National Gallery of Victoria, Australia (2016); and E Tu Ake, the Musee du quai Branly, Paris, France; the Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa, New Zealand; Museo Nacional las Culturas, Mexico City, Mexico; and Musee de la Civilisation, Quebec City, Canada (2011-13). Paterson has participated in major international art fairs and biennales, including The Beauty of Distance: Songs of survival in a precarious age, 17th Biennial of Sydney, Sydney, Australia (2010); Asia Pacific Triennial, Gallery of Modern Art, Brisbane, Australia (2009); nEUclear Reactions, Prague Biennial, Czech Republic (2010); and the 9th Pacific Biennial, Republic of Palau (2001). Paterson’s recent public art commissions include Guide Kaiārahi at Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tāmaki (2021-26); Te Maiea, Aotea Square, Auckland (2021); and The Golden Bearing, Puketerata Garden of National Significance, Taranaki, New Zealand (2016). His works are housed in major public and private collections across Australasia. Paterson’s commitment to reaching outside of the art world and connecting art, industry, fashion and politics has led to long term collaborations with WORLD Fashion house and Dilana Rugs.

Happy Knowing Nothing (Constellation Orion), 2024, glitter, Cook Island black pearls, Japanese fresh water pearls, acrylic and jewellery wire and mixed media on board, 40 x 30 in.

Image Credit: Henry Hargreaves

(L to R): Power Bottom (Constellation Pavo), 2024, 24 x 18 in, and Avoiding Ordinary Boys (Constellation Pavo), 2024, 12 x 16 in, glitter, Cook Island black pearls, Japanese fresh water pearls, acrylic, jewelry wire & mixed media on board.

Image Credit: Henry Hargreaves

Earthalujah (Constellation Pavo), 2024. Glitter, Cook Island black pearls, Japanese fresh water pearls, acrylic and jewellery wire and mixed media on canvas, 40 x 30 in.

Image Credit: Henry Hargreaves

Happy Being No-one But Themselves (Constellation Orion), 2024, Glitter, Cook Island black pearls, Japanese fresh water pearls, acrylic and jewellery wire and mixed media board, 24 x 18 in.

Image Credit: Henry Hargreaves

memory/

One of my greatest inspirations is the sacred environment, across many cords and connections. Being from Aotearoa, New Zealand, and having Māori and Scottish heritage, I grew up deeply connected to the land. We often talk about and think of the land as a personification–as a living, breathing entity. Much of our environment is legally protected, often with a pronoun of “he” or “she”.

I spent my childhood on the west coast of Aotearoa, on a beach called Te Piha. The western side of New Zealand is entirely covered in iron-rich black sands, while the east coast of the islands is painted in white sands.

The black sands come from one specific place, Mount Taranaki, which sits at the halfway point of the North Island. During its eruptions, the volcano released many black rocks and iron-rich ores, later carried by sea currents along the coast. The sands glitter so magnificently, rich in iron and mica, and I remember not only the intense heat of those black sands on my feet but also how they shimmered.

Pairing that with the sun hitting the Tasman Sea, I found myself growing up in a glittering environment. Much of what I saw in that environment has found its way into my practice, particularly through materials like glitter, diamond dust, glass, and Pacific pearls. In honoring the glittering surfaces in nature, and acknowledging they are living entities, I believe I can engage and grant these moments in our landscapes with prestige.

Piha Beach. Courtesy of the artist.

Piha Beach. Courtesy of the artist.

line/

Although there are many different tribal groups throughout Aotearoa, each with its own beginnings, my tribal group, Ngāti Rangitihi, traces its lineage directly back to the stars. For the East Coast tribe I come from, the star cluster Te Huihui o Te Kakahu or Orion is incredibly important. The main stars within the Orion constellation reflect back to Earth the architectural design of our main meeting and ancestral houses, or wharenui. Here, the stars are a community of our distant future, reflected back on Earth as architectural memoirs.

At the forefront of my new body of work, built from my observations of the stars from the Southern Hemisphere, is the idea of representing something that was once in heaven and bringing it back home to Earth. The work reflects the Hermetic phrase “As within, so without, as above, so below, as the universe, so the soul.”

I’m intrigued by the perspective of looking through colonial apertures to access our indigenous truths. Using the Hubble telescope as that vehicle seemed like the perfect lens, especially since it’s primarily American-made. I like this idea of being centered here in New York and looking through an American lens back into the Southern Hemisphere, at the constellations that guided my people across the Pacific Oceans to their final destination of Aotearoa, New Zealand.

Image Credit: Henry Hargreaves

color/

I’ve kept my techniques and painting processes close since I began exhibiting 30 years ago. Moving to New York has shifted my practice, and I’ve returned to the acrylic medium. I’ve never worked with pearls, but now they’re part of my work. This city can’t help but impress herself upon you, and in the first instance, I wonder if being drawn back to the airbrush and the velvety finishes in my new work might be influenced by New York’s wallpapered graffiti-covered streets.

Everything I put into a painting is intentional. Nothing is there to be decorative, though, at first glance, we may associate those materials with decoration or see them locked into stereotypes of drag, craft, or carnival. There is a fine line between stereotype and sophistication, which I’m happy to dare and dance with.

My inspiration from growing up at Te Piha brought me back to those shorelines through materials like mica, with its glittering effect. I look to the Pacific Ocean and particularly the Cook Islands, the source of my black pearls. Everything I’m invested in seems to be within the depths of the Pacific Ocean or just at the precipice where the Pacific meets the shore, at those sparkling sandbars.

There is a story from the Pacific that the stars looked down into the darkness of the waters and cried, overcome with sadness by the darkness that the ocean occupied. As those tears fell into the ocean, they transformed into pearls to illuminate some of that darkness. My practice responds to genealogy or whakapapa, which establishes a foundation where the inanimate and animate layers are interconnected. It’s beautiful to think that something so far away—the stars—and something we are so close to—the ocean—are connected through tears that became vehicles for light.

Every black and white pearl in my works has been plotted and mapped to its exact position from the Hubble Space Telescope images. Each pearl is also scaled to the size of the stars from these images. It’s an act of ultimate respect, to honor each star's exact place in the universe.

Work in progress. Courtesy of the artist.

addendum: on language/

The word is a powerful instance. My father was of a generation where the Māori language was punishable in school. So, when young Māori kids were speaking the language, Te Reo Māori, in school, they were very often beaten for doing so. To use the language became an offense, treated with violence.

I trained as an elementary school teacher for two years before becoming a full-time artist. In 2000, when I was teaching, Te Reo Māori was taught in schools at a basic level. When I was training, those were the first years that teachers were trained to teach in Kura Kaupapa Māori schools that offered Te Reo Māori immersion education. These systems sought to revitalize the Māori language and enable students to “live as Māori.” The reintroduction of teaching Te Reo Māori doesn't just come as a language—it comes with an acknowledgment of all the things that language describes and can philosophize within a culture. It goes very deep into mātauranga Māori: traditional knowledge which includes our worldview, cultural practices, and environmental knowledge.

Now, we are seeing generations of children emerge out of Kaupapa Māori-led education systems. You see it on social media—young ones like Hana-Rawhiti Maipi-Clarke representing Te Pataī Māori as a member of the New Zealand Parliament, standing in incredibly prestigious spaces and leading nations at such a young age. It's a monumental time.

What we're witnessing now is the result of the language coming back. It's said that when a language is lost, it takes three generations for it to return. Now we're seeing the third generation come to maturity, moving through the world with an understanding based on our language. Even small things, like initiating language repatriation, can lead to major strides toward sovereignty. It's a beautiful evolution of power that we're finally able to see: the ability to take back, rightfully, what is ours.

Written and interviewed by Gabrielle Luu.

Gabrielle Luu is a writer based in Brooklyn, NY and the Editor-in-Chief of Civil Art.

Published December 31, 2024.