03 Magazine: April 05, 2024

Arts | Magazine 67
Kim, what sparked the idea for this exhibition?
It all began with a desire to take a single object form, one
that was recognisable and broadly relatable, and consider
it over an extended timeframe. We were curious about
how one object could express something about material
culture in Aotearoa – what stories and insights might
emerge. The chair was an easy choice. As a design object,
the form jumps across disciplines, speaking strongly to
craft-based practice as well as design and architecture.
It’s also a particular object in terms of how
democratically it is used throughout domestic, public,
and professional contexts – it’s ubiquitous, although
holding a body in a seated position at a particular height
is no easy design task!
For many reasons, chairs remain sought-after and
well-loved objects.
Tell us a little about your personal chair history…
The chairs I remember from my childhood came in
suites. Tightly stuffed armchairs that belonged to a
three‐part set, upright and plump with a pleated fabric
fringe that hovered off the ground. The steel-tube-lines of
the chairs and Formica table in the kitchen. The original
chairs from my grandparents’ Oamaru farmhouse with a
red-chequered seat – these are still used every day by my
children, the tiny matching table long since delegated to
the sewing room.
The most memorable single chair I remember
encountering is the La-Z-Boy. My grandparents each had
one: in prime position by the fire and with a clear line to
the television, the two objects dictated the hierarchies
of the lounge. They were luxurious and costly for the
time; under no circumstances were they to be sat on
by grandchildren.
“Chairs have come from
all across the country
– spotting something
familiar is highly likely!”
The Objectspace website states of the exhibition,
“This is not the definitive history of chair design and
making in Aotearoa. Instead, it is a story of ad hoc
research and discovery that begins and ends with
an evocative whalebone chair that resides today in
Auckland Museum” – could you talk to this a little bit,
and tell us about that chair?
One of the first chairs that made it to the list for The
Chair is the Whalebone chair that resides today in
Auckland Museum. Found in Russell in 1944, it’s thought
to date to before 1880.
Composed of a whale vertebra, with three bones
inserted for legs, the chair is a product of necessity, made
by a whaler needing something to sit on. It’s an evocative
thing, bringing to life a time of early colonial settlement
and the unpalatable conditions of the whaling industry.
Not many of us have seen the Whalebone chair in
real life (myself included) and yet it’s one of the few
pieces of historical New Zealand furniture that have been
documented and written about with some frequency.