Stonsesense, Te Wai Ngutu Kaakaa Gallery

August 2023

We are all mineral beings. Our bodies, whether animal bodies, plant bodies or stony bodies, enfold minerals such as iron within. Acknowledging our collective minerality can shift our understanding of ourselves and the universe we live in. Minerals cross the binary that separates the living from the non-living, loosening the categories between entities in the world. Perhaps this recognition can foster a sense of kinship along the mineral pathways that connect us all.

In Stonesense, Simpson offers encounters with iron forged from onepuu, the black magnetic sand of the West Coast beaches of Te Ika a Maaui North Island. Hand Held are cast iron shapes, intended for touching and holding. Glass vessels hold electroforming systems in which onepuu iron is transformed into self-organising iron crystals. Slag, the byproduct of iron making holds the door open and supports structures. Alongside these sculptural experiments, Simpson presents microscopic views of iron as prints and video, revealing a strikingly organic world that sits beneath the threshold of attention. 

The exhibition Stonesense is not just thinking about stones, rocks, and minerals, it also works to extend our experience of the world, including the awareness of processes occurring in different temporal and scalar levels, sometimes below the threshold of attention. From the cellular mineral elements inside biological bodies to the vast and geologic, the lithic thinking of Stonesense invites an attentiveness to what might not be easily apparent.

How might mineral encounters open potential connections between our human bodies and the material world that we are embedded within? What lithic thoughts might we have?

---