James Oram Currency (video still) 2022. Two-channel 4K video. Courtesy of the artist.
James Oram By Spectral Hands (installation view) 2022.
James Oram By Spectral Hands (installation view) 2022.
James Oram Currency (installation view) 2022. Two-channel 4K video.
James Oram Screens 2022. Brass.
James Oram Edward's noisy ghost 2022. Audio recording of Propaganda (1928) by Edward Bernays, water bottle, tactile transducer.
James Oram By Spectral Hands (installation view) 2022.
James Oram Spectral Hands (detail) 2022. Cyanotype prints of found imagery.
James Oram Spectral Hands (detail) 2022. Cyanotype prints of found imagery.
This exhibition is now closed
In this major new body of work, Ōtautahi artist James Oram creates an ecosystem based on consumer capitalism.
Strategies and mechanics of marketing are turned into sculptures and video, as physical interpretations of website wireframes, advertising imagery and customer engagement symbols. Objects melt, evaporate and vibrate as Oram alludes to the unseen forces of the market that we encounter every day. The metaphor of the invisible hand behind the free market economy and ideas from the father of public relations, Edward Bernays, are integrated to consider how our needs and desires are manipulated for corporate profit.
Made with generous support from Creative New Zealand
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Date:
9 November 2022 – 19 February 2023 -
Location:
Touring Gallery A -
Curator:
Melanie Oliver -
Exhibition number:
1144
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Director's Foreword
Director's Foreword
Welcome to the summer 2022/23 issue of Bulletin. Since our last magazine was published I’ve been enjoying the view from my office window, which takes in a new installation that fills the high void above the Gallery’s reception desk. Tīkawe is the first work the Mata Aho Collective have created with harakeke, braiding 530 metres over several months. An exceptionally beautiful addition to our foyer, it’s lovely to watch the shadows Tīkawe casts move and morph as the spring sun tracks across the sky. My thanks to the W. A. Sutton Trust for funding this new commission and addition to the Gallery’s collection.
Commentary
James Oram: By Spectral Hands
In the American psychological thriller Severance, the employees of Lumon Industries undergo a surgical procedure that separates their work and non-work memories. The uncanny plot unfolds into what feels like a terrifyingly accurate portrayal of the power that corporations exert over our lives, and the integration of the self into capitalism. In this fictional world Mark and his co-workers willingly join the corporation, blind to what it is they do as part of the Macrodata Refinement team. The series offers insight into how data has become a core part of capitalism, despite the over-abundance of information in a system founded on scarcity. Further, Severance’s data sorters must categorise and file the numbers that appear on their computer screens based on their emotional response to them, rather than applying logic, thereby integrating their feelings to the digital realm.