Designers Speak (Up) + Vapour Momenta Books

Join Designers Speak (Up) and Vapour Momenta Books (Catherine Griffiths and Bruce Connew) for the launch of the book Present Tense: Wāhine Toi Aotearoa—a paper record., a documentation of the eponymous 2019 poster project and exhibition hīkoi.

A perpetual, waving, ‘red ink on paper’ flag, Present Tense : Wāhine Toi Aotearoa—a paper record. is a reminder of the challenges, issues and questions that continue to confront a community of designers, and beyond. The Poster Call delivered a sense of empowerment, a collective action, and an awareness amongst those who participated that they have aided and abetted the ambition of Designers Speak (Up) to “record the current landscape of women in design” and offer some visibility to the unheralded diversities of Aotearoa New Zealand design. The act of making this book is a further manifestation of activism in the spirit of the project.

—Catherine Griffiths, ‘—a paper record.’ from her introduction to the book

To record the current landscape of women* in design and give visibility to the unsung diversity of Aotearoa design, the online platform Designers Speak (Up) made an open call early 2019 to all designers, artists and educators from the Directory of Women* Designers to design a poster using the medium to explore and address any issue social, cultural, or political issue of their choice.

Present Tense : Wāhine Toi Aotearoa presented the accumulation of posters in various forms—from printed to projected to published online—over the course of the nine month project and exhibition hīkoi... six galleries and public spaces, the length of Aotearoa... which launched 30 April 2019 in Kirikiriroa at Ramp Gallery, finishing 23 November at Enjoy Contemporary in Pōneke.

The project gave visibility and voice to *[women/womxn/wāhine/-identifying and non-binary] designers to speak (up) using the poster medium.

With the support of the Lost Time calendar project, and Creative New Zealand, Designers Speak (Up) and Vapour Momenta Books will launch the book at Ramp Festival, 8 August; Enjoy Contemporary Art Space, 12 August; and Te Tuhi, 26 August, 2023.

Courtesy of Catherine Griffiths.

Read more about Present Tense : Wāhine Toi Aotearoa—a paper record.:

https://designersspeakup.nz/book/