Kohikohi’s whare inspired me to continue developing my on-going photographic project on emptied heritage spaces when I photographed Anderson Park Art Gallery’s spacious rooms stripped of artworks and objects in 2017. The small modest whare, built in 1837 at Aparima Riverton, presented an opportunity to extend that body of work but on a much smaller scale.
Paper Thin presents a series of photographs exploring the whare’s ornamental papered walls covered with gypsum paneling. Pieces of these hidden papers are exposed by small cut-outs in the panels. Nondescript present day paper, covering the paneling, frames the nineteenth and mid twentieth century papers revealing changing tastes and layers of time in the whare’s decorative interior.
