top of page

Jade Townsend (Ngāti Kahungunu, Te Ātihaunui-a-Pāpārangi) is a multi-disciplinary artist and curator working at the intersection of her Māori, Pākehā, and British heritage. Born and raised in Whanganui, she moved to Liverpool as a teenager. Exposure to a wide range of accents, dialects, regional slang, folktales, and pūrākau made her aware of the limitations of translation and cultural hybridity as a transparent process. Through a range of hand-made interventions, she interrogates materials to reveal their transformative qualities.

'The notion of being two very opposite things at once—'native' and 'foreign', a symbol of the 'authentic' and also an 'imitation'—is of ongoing fascination for me. I find myself attracted to the artificial or synthesised aspects of culture as a beginning point: the hyperreal, the exaggerated.'

 

Exhibition History : Solo

Matariki, Whānau Mārama, Commercial Bay, NZ, 2021

Te Moana-a-Kiwa, Objectspace, Tāmaki Makaurau, NZ, 2021

Panic Buy, RM Gallery, Tāmaki Makaurau, NZ, 2021

Ā muri atu : A colaborative show with Emiko Sheehan) RAMP, Hamilton, NZ, 2021

HOMESICK/SICKHOME, Page Galleries, Wellington, NZ, 2020

ALL THE RAGE, Millers O'Brien, Wellington, NZ, 2019

Designer Island, ENA, Wellington, NZ, 2018

R.I.P. Kirks, Precinct 35, Wellington, NZ, 2016

Shopping and Other Rituals, Pataka Musuem & Art, Porirua, NZ, 2016

Singles Day, 30Upstairs Gallery, Wellington, NZ, October  2015

Typical Relics, Enjoy Gallery, Wellington, New Zealand, 2015

Typical Relics, IT Beijing Market, Beijing, China, 2014/15

 

Group

Turning a page, starting a chapter, Gus Fisher Gallery, NZ, 2022

Hono, Season, NZ, 2022

Text Tile, Melbourne, Aus, 2022

When The Dust Settles, Artspace, NZ, 2021

Whānau Mārama, Commercial Bay, NZ, 2021

He Taura Here, Laree Payne, Kirikiriroa, NZ, 2021

Mood Machine, Current, NZ, 2018

London Intensive, Camden Arts Centre, London, UK, 2017

Dark Objects, The Dowse, NZ, 2017

Visiting Asia, Te Tuhi, Auckland, NZ 2015/6

Imagine Asia, Pataka Museum, Porirua, NZ, 2015

The Yellow Ones Are Mine, Intelligentsia Gallery, Beijing, China, 2015

 

Residencies

Va Moana, NZ, 2021

Artspace, Tāmaki Makaurau, NZ, 2021

Hauhake, Objectspace, Tāmaki Makaurau, NZ, 2020

London Summer Intensive, Slade School of Art with Camden Arts Centre, London, 2017

WARE Asia New Zealand Foundation Artist in Residence, Beijing, China, 2014

30 Upstairs Gallery, Wellington, New Zealand, 2012

 

Education    

 

BA Hons: Fine Art-Painting: Manchester Metropolitan University, Manchester, UK, 2010

                Diploma in Fine Art : Liverpool Community College, 2007

bottom of page