In the age of widespread digital communication what does it mean to deploy the banner as an analogue means of public expression or protest? Either hastily made or beautifully finished, banners visually gesture to a mode of collective expression, distilled from a plurality of voices and fuelled by the urgency of action.
Working Together chronicles projects over the past five years by Auckland-based artist Fiona Jack that explore the use of banners as key leitmotif; as an instrument of expression, protest or solidarity. Jack's banners call into question the responsiveness and democratic symbolism of a shared goal and reflects her longstanding interest in how artistic gestures overlap with those of community action and politics. Oscillating between singular and plural voices, a political imperative propels Jack's practice and posits the multiple as a site of agency.
Speaking to one of the featured projects – The Will of the People is Law – writer and curator Michael Ned Holte states: "Made and remade, the banners gesture toward historical claims of willpower. And in the force or even absurdity of its reputation the phrase reveals its allegorical potential for the present or even the future."
Featuring written contributions from Gwyneth Porter, Michael Ned Holte and Peter Shand, Working Together sees Jack's practice unfurl as a set of encounters; mediations between power and powerlessness, text and image, history and action.
118 pages, softcover, 26 x 18 cm, Le Roy Publishing/DDMMYY (Auckland)