Abigail Aroha Jensen and Tamsen Hopkinson

Bootleg

05 Jul — 24 Aug

A Palette hair dye box that has been opened on the ground next to a hair dye container stained by hair dye. The ground is interconnected red and grey rectangular paving stones.
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Abigail Aroha Jensen, working image, 2025.

On the left of the image is a partial view of a deconstructed printing press. On the right of the image is a chaotic display of synthetic hair and other reclaimed materials hanging from the walls onto the floor. Wooden floors surrounded by white walls
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Bootleg (install view), 2025. Photo by Bri Lawrence.

On a white wall there are hanging materials that are not identifiable but contain synthetic hair and plastic bags. In the background are rectangles of orange tape on the same while walls
3

Abigail Aroha Jensen, install view with Vanity Kit, Rat I and Rachel Dolezal, all 2025. Photo by Bri Lawrence.

In focus is two rectangles of orange tape on a white wall that contain doodles in green paint. There is a bright white light in the bottom right corner on the floor
4

Abigail Aroha Jensen, install view with Vanity Kit and Rachel Dolezal, both 2025. Photo by Bri Lawrence.

In focus is a long collection of materials that have been tied together and are hanging from the ceiling and draping on the floor towards the viewer. It is a collection of plastic, soft toys, and synthetic materials that are all colourful.
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Abigail Aroha Jensen, install view with Vanity Kit and Rachel Dolezal, both 2025. Photo by Bri Lawrence.

Close up detail of various scavenged materials that have been tied together and are hanging from a rope. The background is a blank white wall.
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Abigail Aroha Jensen, Vanity Kit (detail), 2025. Photo by Bri Lawrence.

A close up of fake flowers and other materials that have been tied together with string in a shape that loosely resembles the number nine
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Abigail Aroha Jensen, Vanity Kit (detail), 2025. Photo by Bri Lawrence.

extreme close up of fibre that appears to be from a rope that has been pulled apart where it connects to a fixing into a white wall
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Abigail Aroha Jensen, Vanity Kit (detail), 2025. Photo by Bri Lawrence.

In focus is four hair dye boxes that have been unevenly stacked on top of each other sitting on a wooden floor. In the background a pick soft toy is visible in the corner of a room
9

Abigail Aroha Jensen, Vanity Kit (detail) and Rachel Dolezal, 2025. Photo by Bri Lawrence.

2 intersecting rectangles of orange tape that contain pieces of paper that have been painted on in loose doodles of green and orange paint. In front of the paper hands a rope and a box of hairdye.
10

Abigail Aroha Jensen, Vanity Kit (detail), 2025. Photo by Bri Lawrence.

A close up of a box of hair dye that has had a moko kauae drawn onto the woman on the box, hanging in front of a white wall with a moa-like bird drawn on in green pen
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Abigail Aroha Jensen, Vanity Kit (detail), 2025. Photo by Bri Lawrence.

A black tiled wall that has been defaced with blue and red spray paint. synthetic hair is hanging from the wall and on the floor. A small window can be seen on the right side.
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Abigail Aroha Jensen, Vanity Kit (detail), 2025. Photo by Bri Lawrence.

A close up of a bright white light being reflected off of a small plastic pink mirror. The light and mirror are sitting in front of a black tiled wall that is also illuminated
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Abigail Aroha Jensen, Vanity Kit (detail), 2025. Photo by Bri Lawrence.

An external view of a window that has been covered on the inside by what looks like magazines on the top half and plastic on the bottom half. 6 small neon coloured candles can be seen sitting on a windowsill inside.
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Abigail Aroha Jensen, Vanity Kit (detail), 2025. Photo by Bri Lawrence.

An external view of a window that have been decorated with stickers. The stickers are a variety of colourful hearts and silver numbers that are in strict lines.
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Abigail Aroha Jensen, Vanity Kit (detail), 2025. Photo by Bri Lawrence.

A messy braid of synthetic blonde hair is hanging from the wall. A piece of pink hair has been attached to the braid and is falling to the ground.
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Abigail Aroha Jensen, Vanity Kit (detail) and Rat I, both 2025. Photo by Bri Lawrence.

a close up of a small multi-coloured clay rat that has a long yellow tail and bobby pins for whiskers that is facing to the left and is places on top of a power point.
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Abigail Aroha Jensen, Rat I, 2025. Foam air clay, bobby pins. Photo by Bri Lawrence.

a wide angle shot of a deconstructed printing press that is orderly placed along the ground with reams of paper hanging from the ceiling. In the background two windows are visible showing trees outside.
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Bootleg (install view), 2025. Photo by Bri Lawrence.

a wide angle shot of a deconstructed printing press that is orderly placed along the ground with reams of paper hanging from the ceiling. In the background two windows are visible showing trees outside.
19

Bootleg (install view), 2025. Photo by Bri Lawrence.

a wide angle shot of a deconstructed printing press that is orderly placed along the ground with reams of paper hanging from the ceiling. all the pieces are sitting on a brown wooden floor.
20

Tamsen Hopkinson, Crimson and Clover, 2025. 1869 Hopkinson & Cope Albion press, wooden
typeset, tracing paper, newsprint, silver Posca
markers, aluminium tube, AM radio. Photo by Bri Lawrence.

Close up detail of small metal mechanical parts that have been orderly places on a wooden floor.
21

Tamsen Hopkinson, Crimson and Clover (detail), 2025. Photo by Bri Lawrence.

A roll of white paper that has been partially unrolled towards the viewer with text written in silver marker pens. The text can be seen to be written in Te Reo Maori but the kupu are not readable.
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Tamsen Hopkinson, Crimson and Clover (detail), 2025. Photo by Bri Lawrence.

A roll of white paper is appearing from the top of the imagethat has been partially unrolled towards the viewer with text written in silver marker pens. The text can be seen to be written in a mix of English and Te Reo Maori but the kupu are not readable.
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Tamsen Hopkinson, Crimson and Clover (detail), 2025. Photo by Bri Lawrence.

Four images hang on a white wall behind glass without frames. The images are screenshots of Instagram posts with details that cannot be seen from the perspective of the viewer
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Abigail Aroha Jensen, (left to right) PINEAPPLE, APPLE/GOOGLE, OCEANIA, NGA PUHI, EZEKIEL 18:13 etc., all 2025. 3mm clear acrylic prints. Photo by Bri Lawrence.

A close up of an instagram post hanging on a white wall behind glass. The text cannot be read but shows two lollys still in their wrapper, the lolly on the left is yellow, the other is white
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Abigail Aroha Jensen, PINEAPPLE and APPLE/GOOGLE, 2025. Photo by Bri Lawrence.

A close up of an instagram post hanging on a white wall behind glass. The text cannot be read but the image shows a wooden up out of Australia with the words "OCEANIA" on top of it.
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Abigail Aroha Jensen, OCEANIA, 2025. Photo by Bri Lawrence.

A close up of an instagram post hanging on a white wall behind glass. The text of the post reads "Ezekiel 18:13. Lends at interest and takes profit; shall he then live? He shall not live. He has done all these abominations; he shall surely die"
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Abigail Aroha Jensen, EZEKIEL 18:13 etc., 2025. Photo by Bri Lawrence.

Bootleg: Abigail Aroha Jensen and Tamsen Hopkinson

05.07.25–24.08.25

Mihi whakatau and opening celebration on 04.07.2025 at 5.30pm

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Bootleg is an exhibition about production and transmission beyond sanctioned channels: concealed objects, attempted translation, unauthorised sound, items taken and distributed at night, nocturnal documents, a break-in.

By way of accumulation and disassembly, Abigail Aroha Jensen and Tamsen Hopkinson deal with how theft is inscribed in the land and materials abandoned to it. Activities like looting, copying, and discarding are familiar modes of relating to the conditions of the contemporary. Both artists in Bootleg engage with this incessant continuum of sonic and physical debris that scores the present, to produce tactile tools that transmute such inherited systems and expectations of behaviour.

*****

Abigail Aroha Jensen is an artist who lives in Ngāruawāhia, Waikato. She holds a BMA from Waikato Institute of Technology, and Honours from Toihoukura, School of Māori Visual Arts. Recent exhibitions include Rope Play (I-IV), sites across Aotearoa including Tāmaki Makaurau, Pōneke, Heretaunga, Ōtepoti, Kirikiriroa, Köln, Germany and Busan Biennale in South Korea (2022-24); Spring Time is Heart-break: Contemporary Art in Aotearoa, Christchurch Art Gallery Te Puna o Waiwhetū (2023); Glittering Images, Grace Aotearoa (2024); Inside my papahou: puoro tuatini. Her site, Désirée – ā whakamātao owha co-commissioned by Te Tuhi and the Busan Biennale Organising Committee, South Korea (2024); cab-sous vide, The Dowse Art Museum, curated by Felixe Lainge (2024); and What thrives on these soils, at Te Whare Toi o Heretaunga, Hastings Art Gallery (2025).

Tamsen Hopkinson (b.1986, Ngāti Kahungunu, Ngāti Pāhauwera) is an artist and curator from Aotearoa based in Naarm. She is interested in systems of measurement, language and the fraught application of these systems to ideas of sovereignty and agency. Tamsen completed a BFA (hons) / BA majoring in Painting, Art History and Philosophy from University of Auckland’s Elam School of Fine Arts (2010). Recent exhibitions include The Wishing Well, CONNORS CONNORS (2024), Signal Detection, Mejia (2024), Octopus 23: THE FIELD, Gertrude Contemporary (2023), and Open Glossary with James Nguyen, Australian Centre of Contemporary Art (2023).

 

Listen to Abigail Aroha Jensen on RNZ Culture 101

Te mihi whakatau me te hui whakatuwhera i tū i te 04.07.2025 i te 5.30pm

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Ko Bootleg tētahi whakaaturanga mō ngā momo whakaputanga me ngā momo whakawhitinga kāore nei i te whai i ngā ara e whakaaetia ana: he rawa kua hunaia, he ngana ki te whakamāori, he oro kāore i te whakaaetia, he rawa kua whānakohia, kua tiria hoki i te pō, he kōnae nō te pō, he urutomokanga.

Mā roto mai i te kohikohi me te wāwāhitanga, ka whakapuaki whakaaro a Abigail Aroha Jensen rāua ko Tamsen Hopkinson mō te āhua o te tuhia o te whānakotanga ki ngā hītori o te whenua me ngā rawa kua whakarērea iho i reira. Ko ngā mahi, pēnei i te pāhua, i te tārua whānako, i te rukenga, he ara kāore nei i te hou e hāngai ana ki ngā āhuatanga o nāianei. Kōrero ai te tokorua nei mō tēnei tūāwhiorangi mōrihariha e karioi ana o ngā kotakota pāorooro, o ngā kotakota kikokiko hoki e hao nei i te inamata, e heipū mai ai ngā rawa ringapā e panoni nei i ngā pūnaha tuku iho me ngā kawatau o ngā whanonga.

*****

He ringatoi a Abigail Aroha Jensen e noho ana ki Ngāruawāhia, ki Waikato. He BMA tōna nō Waikato Institute of Technology, me tētahi tāhū paetahi nō Toihoukura. Ko ētahi o ana whakaaturanga o nā tata nei, ko Rope Play (I-IV) i ētahi wāhi puta i Aotearoa, tae atu ki Tāmaki Makaurau, ki Pōneke, ki Heretaunga, ki Ōtepoti, ki Kirikiriroa, ki Köln i Tiamana, ki Busan Biennale hoki i Kōrea ki te Tonga (2022-24); ko Spring Time is Heart-break: Contemporary Art in Aotearoa i Te Puna o Waiwhetū (2023); ko Glittering Images i Grace Aotearoa (2024); ko Inside my papahou: puoro tuatini. Her site, Désirée – ā whakamātao owha i tonoa ai e Te Tuhi me te Busan Biennale Organising Committee i Kōrea ki te Tonga (2024); ko cab-sous vide i The Dowse Art Museum i rauhītia ai e Felixe Lainge (2024); me What thrives on these soils i Te Whare Toi o Heretaunga (2025).

He ringatoi, he kairauhī hoki a Tamsen Hopkinson (i whānau i te 1986, nō Ngāti Kahungunu, nō Ngāti Pāhauwera hoki) nō Aotearoa, ā, e noho ana ki Naarm. E ngākaunui ana ia ki ngā pūnaha ine, ki ngā pūnaha reo, me te whakahāngai tahitanga o ēnei pūnaha ki ngā ariā o te tino rangatiratanga me te mana motuhake. I whakatutuki a Tamsen i tētahi tāhū paetahi BFA / BA e aronui nei ki te Peita, ki te Hītori o te Toi, ki te Tautake hoki i te Elam School of Fine Arts o Waipapa Taumata Rau (2010). Ko ētahi o ana whakaaturanga o nā tata nei, ko The Wishing Well i CONNORS CONNORS (2024), ko Signal Detection i Mejia (2024), ko Octopus 23: THE FIELD i Gertrude Contemporary (2023), me Open Glossary i te taha o James Nguyen i te Australian Centre of Contemporary Art (2023).

Free Downloads:
Bootleg - roomsheet (pdf)