Introduction to “Place and Space”

Abstract

This essay introduces a section of “Grounded in Place: Dialogues between First Nations Artists from Australia, Taiwan, and Aotearoa,” a special issue of Pacific Arts. “Place and Space” includes texts and images by artists Leah King-Smith (Australia), Anchi Lin (Ciwas Tahos, 林安琪) (Taiwan) and Ngahuia Harrison (Aotearoa New Zealand). The contributions of these three practitioners—all involved in lens-based and digital media—speak to loss of sovereignty and ways forward through contemporary art. Their reflections on recent projects prove their practices to be forms of claiming personal and culturally political territory in the face of centuries of exclusion and prejudice in colonial contexts.