Before Sunrise, ARTSTATION, Tāmaki Makaurau Auckland, 2010

The seven works in this installation represented the stars of Matariki (pleiades), commonly referred to as the Māori New Year, but more traditionally a time for wananga – a chance to broaden ones understanding of spiritual matters when the connections between these realms were strongest. Visitors to Before Sunrise were given the option to cross a line of red chalk on the floor dividing the gallery in order to move closer to the seven large paper cut-outs mounted on the far wall. Beyond the simple act of stepping over this demarcation, visitors were also being invited to make a transcendental shift.

Hutchinson pays close attention to the symbolism of different materials in referencing that threshold. In the essay that accompanied Before Sunrise, Megan Tamati-Quennell noted that the red chalk is suggestive of kōkōwai, the red ochre often used by Māori to render things sacred. The black builders paper Hutchinson used in the seven cut-outs also reference a common weather-proofing material that is inserted in the walls or in roofs, providing a layer of separation between cladding. In Hutchinson’s hands, the function of the black builder’s paper as an in-between material is reiterated two-fold; the paper becomes the concertina folds that define space while the uncut black acts as the border between the cut-out patterns in the voids.

- excerpt from Voids and Veils an essay by Karl Chitham and Ioana Gordon-Smith published in Lonnie Hutchinson: Black Bird, 2014