Fiona Dorothy Pardington (born 1961) is a New Zealand artist, her principal medium being photography.

Early life and education

Pardington was born Fiona Dorothy Cameron in Devonport, and was brought up on

Auckland Auckland (pronounced ) ( mi, Tāmaki Makaurau) is a large metropolitan city in the North Island of New Zealand. The List of New Zealand urban areas by population, most populous urban area in the country and the List of cities in Oceania by po ...

Hibiscus Coast The Hibiscus Coast is a populated area on a stretch of the Hauraki Gulf coast in New Zealand's Auckland Region. It has a population of making it the 11th most populous urban area in New Zealand, and the second most populous in the Auckland Re ...

, where she attended

Orewa College Orewa College is a state coeducational combined intermediate and secondary school located in Orewa, on the Hibiscus Coast north of Auckland, New Zealand. A total of students from Years 7 to 13 (ages 10 to 18) attend the school as of History ...

.New Zealand Photography from the 1840s to the present, William Main, John B. Turner, published by PhotoForum Inc., 1993 She descends from three

Māori Māori or Maori can refer to: Relating to the Māori people * Māori people of New Zealand, or members of that group * Māori language, the language of the Māori people of New Zealand * Māori culture * Cook Islanders, the Māori people of the C ...

iwi Iwi () are the largest social units in New Zealand Māori society. In Māori roughly means "people" or "nation", and is often translated as "tribe", or "a confederation of tribes". The word is both singular and plural in the Māori language, an ...

, (

Ngāi Tahu Ngāi Tahu, or Kāi Tahu, is the principal Māori (tribe) of the South Island. Its (tribal area) is the largest in New Zealand, and extends from the White Bluffs / Te Parinui o Whiti (southeast of Blenheim), Mount Mahanga and Kahurangi Poi ...

Kāti Māmoe Kāti Māmoe (also spelled Ngāti Māmoe but not by the tribe themselves) is a historic Māori iwi. Originally from the Hastings area, they moved in the 16th century to the South Island which at the time was already occupied by the Waitaha. A ...

and

Ngāti Kahungunu Ngāti Kahungunu is a Māori iwi located along the eastern coast of the North Island of New Zealand. The iwi is traditionally centred in the Hawke's Bay and Wairārapa regions. The tribe is organised into six geographical and administrative di ...

), and the Scottish

Clan Cameron Clan Cameron is a West Highland Scottish clan, with one main branch Lochiel, and numerous cadet branches. The Clan Cameron lands are in Lochaber and within their lands lies Ben Nevis which is the highest mountain in the British Isles. The Chief ...

of Erracht. Knowing that she wanted to become a photographer from the age of six, Pardington studied photography at

Elam School of Fine Arts The Elam School of Fine Arts, founded by John Edward Elam, is part of the Faculty of Creative Arts and Industries at the University of Auckland. Students study degrees in fine art with an emphasis on a multidisciplinary approach. The schoo ...

University of Auckland , mottoeng = By natural ability and hard work , established = 1883; years ago , endowment = NZD $293 million (31 December 2021) , budget = NZD $1.281 billion (31 December 2021) , chancellor = Cecilia Tarrant , vice_chancellor = Dawn F ...

graduating with a

Bachelor of Fine Arts A Bachelor of Fine Arts (BFA) is a standard undergraduate degree for students for pursuing a professional education in the visual, fine or performing arts. It is also called Bachelor of Visual Arts (BVA) in some cases. Background The Bachelor ...

in 1984. In 2003, Pardington graduated from Elam School of Fine Arts with a

Master of Fine Arts A Master of Fine Arts (MFA or M.F.A.) is a terminal degree in fine arts, including visual arts, creative writing, graphic design, photography, filmmaking, dance, theatre, other performing arts and in some cases, theatre management or arts admini ...

(First Class Honours) and in 2013 graduated with a

Doctor of Fine Arts Doctor of Fine Arts (D.F.A.) is a doctoral degree in fine arts, may be given as an honorary degree (a degree ''honoris causa'') or an earned professional degree (in the UK). Description Doctoral programmes leading to DFAs are of equivalent level ...

in photography with a doctoral thesis titled ''Towards a Kaupapa of Ancestral Power and Talk''. She has throughout her career held the positions as a lecturer, tutor, assessor and moderator on photography, design and fine arts programmes at universities and polytechnics throughout New Zealand. Pardington's brother Neil Pardington (11 months her junior) is also a well-known photographer and book designer.

Career, themes and style

Early in her career, Pardington worked from a feminist viewpoint to explore themes of love and sex, the representation and perception of the body, and the construction of gender and identity. She specialised in 'pure' or analogue darkroom techniques, most notably hand printing and toning. In the 1980s, borrowing from early, highly romanticized

pictorialist Pictorialism is an international style and aesthetic movement that dominated photography during the later 19th and early 20th centuries. There is no standard definition of the term, but in general it refers to a style in which the photographer ha ...

photography, Pardington challenged the social construction of the eternal feminine by making theatrical photographs of the female nude. In 1990 Pardington won the prestigious Moet et Chandon New Zealand Art Foundation Fellowship. She won the Visa Gold Art Award in 1991 for ''Soft Target'', a work framed with beaten, studded copper and gold-painted wood, that is encrusted with contradictory religious images and texts. Pardington was the recipient of the

Frances Hodgkins Fellowship The Frances Hodgkins Fellowship, established in 1962, is one of New Zealand's premier arts residencies. The list of past fellows includes many of New Zealand's most notable artists. The position is based at the University of Otago in Dunedin, New ...

at the

University of Otago , image_name = University of Otago Registry Building2.jpg , image_size = , caption = University clock tower , motto = la, Sapere aude , mottoeng = Dare to be wise , established = 1869; 152 years ago , type = Public research collegiate u ...

in both 1996 and 1997. In 1997 Pardington won the Visa Gold Art Award for a second time with ''Taniwha'', 1996, a close up of a bar of soap, a colonial relic with an appropriated Māori name. In 2001 Pardington was the Auckland

Unitec Institute of Technology Unitec Institute of Technology (Māori: Te Whare Wānanga o Wairaka) is the largest institute of technology in Auckland, New Zealand. 16,844 students study programmes from certificate to postgraduate degree level (levels 1 to 9) across a range of ...

Artist in Residence and began a body of work examining extant collections of cultural objects or

taonga ''Taonga'' or ''taoka'' (in South Island Māori) is a Maori-language word that refers to a treasured possession in Māori culture. It lacks a direct translation into English, making its use in the Treaty of Waitangi significant. The current d ...

(treasures) in New Zealand's museums. In 2005 the New Zealand Government gifted the ''Quai Branly Suite of Nine Hei tiki'' to the people of France. Pardington is one of two Māori artists represented by the Musee du Quai Branly. In 2006 Pardington was the

artist in residence at the

Otago Polytechnic Otago Polytechnic was a public New Zealand tertiary education institute, centred in Dunedin with additional campuses in Cromwell and Auckland. Otago Polytechnic provided career-focused education and training, offering a range of New Zealand accr ...

, during which time she studied and photographed nests from the

Otago Museum Tūhura Otago Museum is located in the city centre of Dunedin, New Zealand. It is adjacent to the University of Otago campus in Dunedin North, 1,500 metres northeast of the city centre. It is one of the city's leading attractions and has one of t ...

collection. In 2010 Pardington completed a Laureate Artistic Creations Project with the Musée du Quai Branly, photographing more than fifty casts of Māori, Pacific and European heads, including casts of her Ngāi Tahu ancestors, held in the Musée Flaubert et d’Histoire de la Medecine in

Rouen Rouen (, ; or ) is a city on the River Seine in northern France. It is the prefecture of the Regions of France, region of Normandy (administrative region), Normandy and the Departments of France, department of Seine-Maritime. Formerly one of ...

Muséum National d'Histoire Naturelle The French National Museum of Natural History, known in French as the ' (abbreviation MNHN), is the national natural history museum of France and a ' of higher education part of Sorbonne Universities. The main museum, with four galleries, is loc ...

in Paris and in the

Auckland War Memorial Museum The Auckland War Memorial Museum Tāmaki Paenga Hira (or simply the Auckland Museum) is one of New Zealand's most important museums and war memorials. Its collections concentrate on New Zealand history (and especially the history of the Aucklan ...

. The casts made in the Pacific region during Dumont d’Urville’s last exploratory voyage of 1837–40 by the

phrenologist Phrenology () is a pseudoscience which involves the measurement of bumps on the skull to predict mental traits.Wihe, J. V. (2002). "Science and Pseudoscience: A Primer in Critical Thinking." In ''Encyclopedia of Pseudoscience'', pp. 195–203. C ...

Pierre-Marie Alexandre Dumoutier (1791–1871) included three tattooed warriors: Tangatahara and Piuraki (who are

) and Matua Tawai (from

Kororareka Russell, known as Kororāreka in the early 19th century, was the first permanent European settlement and seaport in New Zealand. It is situated in the Bay of Islands, in the far north of the North Island. History and culture Māori settle ...

). Originally exhibited in vitrines outside the Musée du Quai Branly in Paris, ''Ahua: A beautiful hesitation'', was selected to be exhibited at the 17th

Biennale of Sydney The Biennale of Sydney is an international festival of contemporary art, held every two years in Sydney, Australia. It is a large and well-attended contemporary visual arts event in the country. Alongside the Venice and São Paulo biennales and ...

in May 2010, and was allocated a dedicated gallery space in the

Museum of Contemporary Art Australia The Museum of Contemporary Art Australia (MCA), located on George Street in Sydney's The Rocks neighbourhood, is solely dedicated to exhibiting, interpreting, and collecting contemporary art, from across Australia and around the world. It is ...

. The series is illustrated in ''The Pressure of Sunlight Falling'', published by

Otago University Press Otago University Press is an academic publisher associated with the University of Otago. The press is located in Dunedin, New Zealand. The Otago University Press is the oldest academic publisher in Aotearoa New Zealand. The Otago University Press ...

and was exhibited at the

Govett-Brewster Art Gallery The Govett-Brewster Art Gallery is a contemporary art museum at New Plymouth, Taranaki, New Zealand. The gallery receives core funding from the New Plymouth District Council. Govett-Brewster is recognised internationally for contemporary art. H ...

, New Plymouth and

Dunedin Public Art Gallery The Dunedin Public Art Gallery holds the main public art collection of the city of Dunedin, New Zealand. Located in The Octagon in the heart of the city, it is close to the city's public library, Dunedin Town Hall, and other facilities such as t ...

in 2011. Pardington's work ''Ake Ake Huia'', holds the auction record for a single New Zealand photograph having sold in 2010 for NZ$30,385. Pardington's major work, the ''Quai Branly Suite of Nine Hei Tiki'', holds the auction record for a New Zealand photographic work having sold in 2010 for NZ$64,278. This was one of only two complete sets made by the artist with the other set having been gifted to the people of France by the New Zealand government. Pardington's still-life imagery made in 2012 and 2013 have a painterly quality that visually reference seventeenth-century painting traditions as well as the 16th-century vanitas traditions. The images are not only

memento mori ''Memento mori'' (Latin for 'remember that you ave todie'Colin McCahon Colin John McCahon (; 1August 191927May 1987) was a prominent New Zealand artist whose work over 45 years consisted of various styles, including landscape, figuration, abstraction, and the overlay of painted text. Along with Toss Woollaston and ...

House in

Titirangi Titirangi is a suburb of West Auckland in the Waitākere Ranges local board area of the city of Auckland in northern New Zealand. It is an affluent, residential suburb located 13 kilometres (8 miles) to the southwest of the Auckland city centre ...

, Auckland. A major survey of Pardington's work, ''Fiona Pardington: A Beautiful Hesitation'', featuring more than 100 photographs, was held at

City Gallery Wellington City Gallery Te Whare Toi is a public art gallery in Wellington, New Zealand. History City Gallery Te Whare Toi began its life as the Wellington City Art Gallery on 23 September 1980 in a former office block located at 65 Victoria Street, now ...

in August – November 2015. The exhibition travelled to

Auckland Art Gallery Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tāmaki is the principal public gallery in Auckland, New Zealand. It has the most extensive collection of national and international art in New Zealand and frequently hosts travelling international exhibitions. Set be ...

in 2016. In February 2016 it was announced that Pardington had been selected by curator

Fumio Nanjo is a curator and art historian. Since 2006 he has been the director of the Mori Art Museum in Tokyo. A graduate of Keio University, Nanjo was previously Director of the Institute of Contemporary Arts in Nagoya (1986–1990) and served as commissio ...

for the first Honolulu Biennale, to be held in 2017.

Fellowships, residencies and awards

* 1991 Visa Gold Art Award * 1991 Moet & Chandon Fellow, France * 1996 Frances Hodgkins Fellow * 1997 Visa Gold Art Award * 2001 Auckland Unitec Artist in Residence * 2006 Ngāi Tahu residency at Otago Polytechnic * 2010 Laureate Artistic Creations Project with the Musee du Quai Branly, France * 2011 Arts Foundation Laureate Award recipient * 2013 Colin McCahon House Artists’ Residency * 2016 Chevalier

Ordre des Arts et des Lettres The ''Ordre des Arts et des Lettres'' (Order of Arts and Letters) is an order of France established on 2 May 1957 by the Minister of Culture. Its supplementary status to the was confirmed by President Charles de Gaulle in 1963. Its purpose is ...

* 2017 Appointed a

Member of the New Zealand Order of Merit The New Zealand Order of Merit is an order of merit in the New Zealand royal honours system. It was established by royal warrant on 30 May 1996 by Elizabeth II, Queen of New Zealand, "for those persons who in any field of endeavour, have ren ...

in the

Queen's Birthday Honours The Birthday Honours, in some Commonwealth realms, mark the reigning British monarch's official birthday by granting various individuals appointment into national or dynastic orders or the award of decorations and medals. The honours are present ...

, for services to photography.

Notable exhibitions

;Solo exhibitions *2015–2016 ''Fiona Pardington: A Beautiful Hesitation'',

Christchurch Art Gallery Te Puna o Waiwhetu The Christchurch Art Gallery Te Puna o Waiwhetū, commonly known as the Christchurch Art Gallery, is the public art gallery of the city of Christchurch, New Zealand. It has its own substantial art collection and also presents a programme of New ...

* 2011 ''The Pressure of Sunlight Falling'',

and

*2001 ''One Night of Love'',

Waikato Museum of Art and History Waikato Museum ( mi, Te Whare Taonga o Waikato) is a regional museum located in Hamilton, New Zealand. The museum manages ArtsPost, a shop and gallery space for New Zealand art and design. Both are managed by the Hamilton City Council. Outside ...

;Group exhibitions *2013 ''Among the Machines: Australian and New Zealand Artists'',

* 2012 ''Contact'', Frankfurter Kunstverein, Germany * 2012 ''Arsenale'', Kyiv International Biennale of Contemporary Art, Ukraine *2011 ''Tender is the night'',

* 2010 17th

* 2010 ''Unnerved: The New Zealand Project'',

Queensland Art Gallery The Queensland Art Gallery (QAG) is an art museum located in South Bank, Brisbane, Queensland, Australia. The gallery is part of QAGOMA. It complements the Gallery of Modern Art (GOMA) building, situated only away. The Queensland Art Gallery ...

and

National Gallery of Victoria The National Gallery of Victoria, popularly known as the NGV, is an art museum in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia. Founded in 1861, it is Australia's oldest and most visited art museum. The NGV houses an encyclopedic art collection across two ...

* 2009 ''Photographer Unknown'',

Monash University Museum of Art The Monash University Museum of Art (MUMA), formerly the Monash University Gallery, is a contemporary art museum on Monash University's Caulfield campus on Dandenong Road, Melbourne, Australia. History The Museum grew out of a number of ear ...

* 2009 ''Brought to Light'',

* 2007 ''Photoquai'', Musée du Quai Branly * 2006 ''Mo Tatou: The Ngāi Tahu Whanui exhibition'',

Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa The Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa is New Zealand's national museum and is located in Wellington. ''Te Papa Tongarewa'' translates literally to "container of treasures" or in full "container of treasured things and people that spring fr ...

*2003 ''Te Puāwai o Ngāi Tahu: Twelve contemporary Ngāi Tahu artists'',

Christchurch Art Gallery The Christchurch Art Gallery Te Puna o Waiwhetū, commonly known as the Christchurch Art Gallery, is the public art gallery of the city of Christchurch, New Zealand. It has its own substantial art collection and also presents a programme of New ...

*1996 ''Cultural Safety'',

and

Frankfurter Kunstverein The Frankfurt Art Association (german: link=no, Frankfurter Kunstverein) is an art museum founded in 1829 by a group of influential citizens of the city of Frankfurt, Germany. The aim of the institution is to support the arts in the city, which w ...

*1993 ''

Alter / Image Alter / Image: Feminism and Representation in New Zealand Art 1973-1993 was an exhibition curated by Tina Barton and Deborah Lawler-Dormer to mark the centennial of women's suffrage in New Zealand. It showed at City Gallery Wellington from 1 Augus ...

'',

Publications

*Stuart McKenzie, ''Rising to the Blow'', Épernay, France : Moet et Chandon, 1992. *Kyla Macfarlane, ''One Night of Lovee'', Hamilton: Waikato Museum of Art & History, 2001. *Gina Irish, ''The Heart Derelict'', Dunedin: Otago Polytechnic, 2006. *Fiona Pardington, ''Journey of the Sensualist'', Whanganui: McNamara Gallery, 2008. *Roger Boyce, ''Eros & Agape'', Wellington: Suite Gallery, 2010. *Andrew Paul Wood, ''Blood & Roses'', Christchurch: Jonathan Smart Gallery, 2011. *Andrew Paul Wood, ''Mushrooms : the champignons Barla'', Christchurch: A.P. Wood Publishing, 2011. *Kriselle Baker and Elizabeth Rankin, ''Fiona Pardington : the pressure of sunlight falling'', Dunedin: Otago University Press, 2011. * Aaron Lister et al., ''Fiona Pardington: A Beautiful Hesitation'', Wellington: Victoria University Press, 2015.

Public collections

* Musée du Quai Branly *

National Gallery of Canada The National Gallery of Canada (french: Musée des beaux-arts du Canada), located in the capital city of Ottawa, Ontario, is Canada's national art museum. The museum's building takes up , with of space used for exhibiting art. It is one of the l ...

, Ottawa, Canada *

National Gallery of Art The National Gallery of Art, and its attached Sculpture Garden, is a national art museum in Washington, D.C., United States, located on the National Mall, between 3rd and 9th Streets, at Constitution Avenue NW. Open to the public and free of char ...

, Washington DC, USA * Queensland Art Gallery/Gallery of Modern Art *

Te Papa The Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa is New Zealand's national museum and is located in Wellington. ''Te Papa Tongarewa'' translates literally to "container of treasures" or in full "container of treasured things and people that spring fr ...

* University of Auckland Art Collection, Auckland, New Zealand * Victoria University of Wellington Art Collection, Wellington, New Zealand * Chartwell Collection, Auckland, New Zealand

References

External links

View examples of Fiona Pardington's workFiona Pardington's website
{{DEFAULTSORT:Pardington, Fiona 1961 births Living people New Zealand photographers New Zealand women photographers People from North Shore, New Zealand Ngāi Tahu people Kāti Māmoe people Ngāti Kahungunu people New Zealand people of Scottish descent Elam Art School alumni New Zealand Māori artists Chevaliers of the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres Members of the New Zealand Order of Merit People educated at Orewa College Photographers from Auckland