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Making Ends Meet: Essays & Talks 1992-2004

Passionate, witty and erudite, these essays and talks disclose persistent questionings of the role of institutions in culture. One of New Zealand`s leading writers, Ian Wedde worked from 1994 to 2004 as a member of the conceptual team charged with developing the Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa`s radical agenda. He came to be closely linked with the museum`s aspirations for wide popular appeal, public scholarship and contemporary relevance. Making Ends Meet provides a running commentary on the pressing cultural issues of that project and those years. Above all, Wedde challenges them to remain appealing, self-critical, relevant and unafraid; to refuse official sanctimony and to resist co-option to risk-free national brands. Subjects include the relationship of art and ethnology, the failure of late modernist art history, the construction of official culture, the intellectual history of European exploration in the Pacific, the “Pakeha Maori”, the relationship of archives and narratives, and walking the dog.Sometimes, these themes are focused in discussions of artists and writers including Tony Fomison, Ralph Hotere, Richard Killeen, Colin McCahon, Rachel Chapman, Alan Brunton, Peter Black and Rosalie Gascoigne. Many of the texts in this book were first produced as talks. These were the products of a busy professional life with little time for writing. Always, the voice we hear is relishing what it`s discussing: we can hear Wedde having a good time looking and thinking.

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