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Whirlwind year for Rangi Kipa
The past year has been a whirlwind for artist Rangi Kipa (Taranaki, Te Atiawa Nui Tonu, Ngāti Maniapoto). An invitation to be one of seven emerging and established artists from seven countries to exhibit at the new Museum of Contemporary Art Denver set the wheels in motion.
As the 2006 recipient of the Creative New Zealand Craft/Object Art Fellowship, Rangi spent two months in Bali creating a modern whare whakairo for the inaugral exhibition in Denver, which opened at the end of October.
Keen to explore the notion of the house representing himself rather than an ancestor (as in customary practice), Rangi pushed at the boundaries of expectation. It's something that has become a signature of his work: exploring new and innovative materials and forms.
The resulting work is the "component" whare, Radiàre, constructed to "lock together". Drawing on his skill as a craft artist, he designed the component pieces so they could be reconfigured in response to the environment - in this instance, the Museum of Contemporary Art Denver.
Rangi was supported in Denver by his wife and fellow artist, Julie Kipa, and tohunga whakairo, Te Hau o te Rangi Tutua from Whakatane who attended the opening of the museum to bless the installation of Rangi's artwork.
As the Museum of Contemporary Art Denver's first artist in residence, Rangi spent time with students doing workshops and also demonstarting tā moko. Pleased with the response to his work in Denver and after an exhausting three weeks in the United States, he's glad to be back home again with his whanau in Ohope Beach.
With a dealer gallery in New York and a solo exhibition planned there in 2008, Rangi Kipa looks set to be beckoned again by the United States in the not-to-distant future.
Radiàre by Rangi Kipa features in the exhibition Star Power: Museum as Body Electric, which continues at the Museum of Contemporary Art Denver until February 2008.
