Artists' play up

By Mark Amery Courtesy of The Dominion Post Today he is the epitome of inoffensive behaviour, but once even Monet was an art-world bad boy. We need artists to perplex us with what might seem like mindless acts of violence on what we consider to be art. Artists misbehaving to push ideas into new ground and challenge the status quo. Which is why across town from Monet at Te Papa it's comforting to see photographer Bruce Connew title an exhibition 'I Must Behave'. It suggests he has no intention of doing so. Connew is best known as a documentary photojournalist not shy of political trouble. He often follows those who themselves don't follow rules. In the triptych Censored (also included) he presents rephotographed pages from a National Geographic that he bought in China. Connew photographs pages that he found had been glued together (showing artists' work that mocked China's icons) or had had politically provocative passages blocked out. For the series I Must Behave meanwhile he turns the camera on his own photography. He not only depicts the leftover evidence of bad social behaviour, but in his approach to the images subverts good photography. Fourteen images from a series of 85 provide what feels like a cryptic puzzle to crack. A series of small potential transgressions is provided: a tyre in a waterway, a blow up sex doll and a tino rangatiratanga flag all ask questions about what is good and bad. A pictured condom may be litter and have a hole in it but it also suggests safe sex. Yet the images are also often badly framed, exposed, or in one case terribly pixellated (suggesting it's been filched from the web). In the first image we're presented with two painted eyes photographed on a canvas. There's a game being played here. Via the photographer we are looking at an uncredited artist's work look back at us. And yet the eyes have also been arranged around the wrong way. Throughout the series looking itself is examined as a potentially seditious act. As with the earlier work of Gavin Hipkins we are unsettled by the off-kilter, the seemingly banal and the open-ended nature of the narrative between frames. In that sense these images actually feel quite polite and for all of their unsettling behaviour I don't get enough from them. The remainder of the series is presented on a DVD and perhaps there's a stronger show in their entirety. I preferred the more focussed view of Connew's last bout of bad behaviour, the series I Saw You. Here he played voyeur with camera photographing people parked up at a beach (potentially engaging in bad behaviour themselves), then blurring and colour saturating the results, like Monet beautifying ugliness with impressionism. Whilst Monet's works are held in heavy gold frames that themselves should be considered now a crime against art, I also recommend you see at Te Papa the excellent group exhibition We are not suitable for framing. Its title taken from a Barbara Kruger work, the exhibition presents work by New Zealand women artists over 30 years who have both challenged traditional representations of women and the artistic status quo. Unfortunately the exhibition blurb is far woollier: "an exhibition that challenges us - our ideas about how we behave, and how we represent ourselves" and "an exploration of identity, gender, sexuality and mythology". Once this would have been labelled feminist. A warning that the show contains nudity means something quite different from the Renoir nearby. There's a strong focus on the body and its parts as capable of rich symbolism as well as exploitation, tracing a line from Vivian Lynn's outstanding Guarden Series, weaving hair into steel gateways (work sorely missed from the recent survey show at Adam Art Gallery), through Fiona Pardington's recontextualisation of found 50s pin-ups (echoing Connew's tactics) to Hye Rim Lee's recent videowork. Beautifully presented and curated, featuring artists we always seem in danger of overlooking, this is just the sort of engaging and intelligent show of major work that should be expected of a museum with a big permanent collection. Between this, the fifth floor collection exhibitions and the Monet this is Te Papa realising its potential. Departing Senior Curator Jonathan Mane Wheoki deserves to feel proud. I Must Behave, Bruce Connew, Mary Newton gallery, until 28 February We are unsuitable for framing, Te Papa, until 31 May 19/02/09