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In the beginning there was no Te Wai Pounamu or Aotearoa. The waters of Kiwa rolled over the place now occupied by the South Island, the North Island and Stewart Island. No sign of land existed. Before Raki (the Sky … Continue reading →
A photograph of a volunteer using a small digger to clear the former site of Piko Wholefoods.
A photograph of plantings along a car park border in Lichfield Street.
A photograph of seating at the temporary bus exchange on Lichfield Street.
A photograph of volunteers working at the Fitzgerald Avenue Community Garden.
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When people first settled in Aotearoa, they had no idea that they were sitting upon a slice of one of two supercontinents; Gondwanaland. Around eighty-three million years ago this slice we now live on, known to us as Zealandia, broke … Continue reading →
A photograph of the empty site where the Outdoor Music Room is to be created.
A photograph of the Gap Filler mini-golf hole in the Rotherham Clock Park in Riccarton.
A photograph of the empty site which is to become the Fitzgerald Avenue Community Garden.
A photograph of high school students working at the Fitzgerald Avenue Community Garden.
This apartment building was across the street from our old flat. Now it's an empty lot.
A PDF copy of pages 298-299 of the book Christchurch: The Transitional City Pt IV. The pages document the transitional project 'Dairy Garden'. Photos with permission from Greening the Rubble
The USAR [Urban Search and Rescue] Teams wrote their findings on the doors when they finished their search of a building. This building was cleared by a team from Queensland, Australia on 27 February 2011.
Today Aotearoa continues to take tentative steps back into level 2 of the Covid-19 response, so you might think it strange that I would be voluntarily stepping back into quarantine. But we’re the stepping back into the history – all … Continue reading →
The Canterbury earthquakes and the rebuild are generation-defining events for twenty-first century Aotearoa/ New Zealand. This article uses an actor network approach to explore 32 women’s narratives of being shaken into dangerous disaster situations and reconstituting themselves to cope in socially innovative ways. The women’s stories articulate on-going collective narratives of experiencing disaster and coping with loss in ‘resilient’ ways. In these women’s experiences, coping in disasters is not achieved by talking through the emotional trauma. Instead, coping comes from seeking solace through engagement with one’s own and others’ personal risk and resourcefulness in ways that feed into the emergence of socially innovative voluntary organisations. These stories offer conceptual insight into the multivalent interconnections between resilience and vulnerabilities and the contested nature of post-disaster recovery in Aotearoa/New Zealand. These women gave voice to living through disasters resiliently in ways that forged new networks of support across collective and personal narratives and broader social goals and aspirations for Aotearoa/New Zealand’s future.
Note the innovative use of hay bales on the left side of the image.
Part the First Movember is upon us once again, and to celebrate Undershaved Overgrown Archaeology brings to you a brief history of facial hair in Aotearoa. Movember is all about men’s health, and we’ve previously covered health in the blog … Continue reading →
A PDF copy of pages 300-301 of the book Christchurch: The Transitional City Pt IV. The pages document the transitional project 'Coffee Zone Mini Park'. Photos with permission from Greening the Rubble
A PDF copy of pages 306-307 of the book Christchurch: The Transitional City Pt IV. The pages document the transitional project 'Salisbury St Garden'. Photos with permission from Greening the Rubble
Liquefaction erupted throughout the city during each of the major earthquakes. It had to be cleared and everyone piled it onto the roadside, where it was eventually picked up by City Council trucks. The fine dust permeated the air for weeks, driving many to wear dust masks while outside.
Liquefaction erupted throughout the city during each of the major earthquakes. It had to be cleared and everyone piled it onto the roadside, where it was eventually picked up by City Council trucks. The fine dust permeated the air for weeks, driving many to wear dust masks while outside.
A PDF copy of pages 310-311 of the book Christchurch: The Transitional City Pt IV. The pages document the transitional project 'Rotherham Clock Park'. Photos with permission from Greening the Rubble
A PDF copy of pages 296-297 of the book Christchurch: The Transitional City Pt IV. The pages document the transitional project 'Piko Shop Site'. Photos with permission from Greening the Rubble
A PDF copy of pages 308-309 of the book Christchurch: The Transitional City Pt IV. The pages document the transitional project 'Beach Garden'. Photos with permission from Greening the Rubble
In the days after the devastating earthquake on 22 February 2011, we lost water in my neighbourhood. However, I was able to supplement the water in our emergency kit with water from this spigot in Somerfield Cemetary. Thank you, William Russell.
A Transitional Imaginary: Space, Network and Memory in Christchurch is the outcome and the record of a particular event: the coming together of eight artists and writers in Ōtautahi Christchurch in November 2015, with the ambitious aim to write a book collaboratively over five days. The collaborative process followed the generative ‘book sprint’ method founded by our facilitator for the event, Adam Hyde, who has long been immersed in digital practices in Aotearoa. A book sprint prioritises the collective voice of the participants and reflects the ideas and understandings that are produced at the time in which the book was written, in a plurality of perspectives. Over one hundred books have been completed using the sprint methodology, covering subjects from software documentation to reflections on collaboration and fiction. We chose to approach writing about Ōtautahi Christchurch through this collaborative process in order to reflect the complexity of the post-quake city and the multiple paths to understanding it. The city has itself been a space of intensive collaboration in the post-disaster period. A Transitional Imaginary is a raw and immediate record, as much felt expression as argued thesis. In many ways the process of writing had the character of endurance performance art. The process worked by honouring the different backgrounds of the participants, allowing that dialogue and intensity could be generative of different forms of text, creating a knowledge that eschews a position of authority, working instead to activate whatever anecdotes, opinions, resources and experiences are brought into discussion. This method enables a dynamic of voices that merge here, separate there and interrupt elsewhere again. As in the contested process of rebuilding and reimagining Christchurch itself, the dissonance and counterpoint of writing reflects the form of conversation itself. This book incorporates conflict, agreement and the activation of new ideas through cross-fertilisation to produce a new reading of the city and its transition. The transitional has been given a specific meaning in Christchurch. It is a product of local theorising that encompasses the need for new modes of action in a city that has been substantially demolished (Bennett & Parker, 2012). Transitional projects, such as those created by Gap Filler, take advantage of the physical and social spaces created by the earthquake through activating these as propositions for new ways of being in the city. The transitional is in motion, looking towards the future. A Transitional Imaginary explores the transitional as a way of thinking and how we understand the city through art practices, including the digital and in writing.
This is what my lunch looked like after spending a month in my office, post-quake. The banana had liquefied in its skin but there wasn't any mould or anything else. The banana absolutely reeked, though; I ended up tossing everything that had been in the lunch box.
Aotearoa's biggest demolition job has entered its final stage. This morning media were given a final chance to walk through Christchurch's Lancaster Park before it is completely brought to the ground. The park's grandstands were badly damaged in the 2011 earthquake, and in 2017, $12 million was set aside for it be pulled down. Nicholas Pointon was there.