EXPLOITATION ST.
The initial stages
Wayne Youle
30 August - 20 September, 2004

Currently based in North Canterbury, Wayne Youle has been exhibiting as an artist since 2001, often drawing on his previous experience in graphic design. With his work for The Kiosk, installed to coincide with the Scape 04 Biennial (“exploring the cultural evolution of Aotearoa New Zealand”), Youle has reappropriated popular historic images of Maori - specifically the young wahine used on a set of playing cards.

This questionable mass-produced image of kiwiana kitsch, has been repeated and used by the artist in referencing modern suburban Christchurch, as the playing cards form a row of identical houses lined up on “Exploitation St”, complete with its brightly abrasive Astroturf grass.

Courtesy the artist and Bartley Nees Gallery, Wellington