Site 4. Tony de Lautour (New Zealand)
Monument
Mountfort Gallery, Canterbury Museum
5th September - 3rd November 2002

Painter Tony de Lautour originally trained as a sculptor. He produced SCAPE's smallest site-specific work: a miniature sculpture, hand raised and chased in silver by Nicola Roake, for insertion into the Canterbury Museum.

De Lautour's recent painting has been concerned with 'revisionist histories'. In these works, de Lautour inserts his seedy colonial characters - such as a mangy imperial lion fighting a belligerent kiwi - into historical landscapes by amateur artists. These additions rework history to show its significance: de Lautour's interventions reveal colonial history as less grand and noble than grubby and scruffy.

In Monument de Lautour's characters colonised the museum's own history. Initially appearing to be a Victorian silver epergne - a kind of table-setting - it is only gradually that the viewer became aware of the low-brow narrative present in the work. Reconsidering the work's authenticity as a heritage object, the work compelled viewers to rethink the authenticity of history's 'official' line.

Curator: Lara Strongman