slew, slough, slue
Miranda Bellamy and Amanda Fauteux
‘slew, slough, slue’
reclaimed kahikatea timber, butter
2022 Aotearoa Art Fair ‘Projects’, Tāmaki Makaurau Auckland
Curator: Micheal Do
‘slew, slough, slue’ is a sculptural installation that links Aotearoa’s native kahikatea trees and the history of butter export. The work emerges from our research into the history of Queens Wharf (where the Aotearoa Art Fair takes place) and of the first shipments of New Zealand butter that we made from similar wharfs across the motu in the 1880s, packed in boxes made from kahikatea.
Using found kahikatea floorboards, we referenced the form of the other booths at the Art Fair, within which we displayed a series of moulded butter sculptures that reference ship ropes, wharf cleats, and objects with an association to shipping and wharfs.
In building a sculpture that partly references the format of the modular booths utilised by other galleries and artists at the fair, we hoped that the propositions within our work were at play in the context of the wider fair.
This project was commissioned by The Chartwell Trust with additional support from the Canada Council for the Arts and the New Brunswick Arts Board.