By artist Bev Moon
This installation consists of 24 handmade, life-size garden tools that resemble artifacts unearthed from historic market garden sites. It references the Ng King Brothers Chinese Market Garden, established by my father’s ancestral clan in 1921 in Allenton, Ashburton. At its peak, the garden supplied up to 70% of the region's produce. My grandfather, Ng Kew, lived and worked there in the early 1940s.
The work is a tribute to the labour performed by generations of Chinese settlers and the skills and new crops they brought with them to Aotearoa - crops such as bok choy, Chinese cabbage, chives, garlic, mustard greens, celery, and the “Chinese gooseberry,” now known as kiwifruit. Easter is a traditional time for planting winter crops such as garlic, leafy greens, and brassicas, many of which were introduced to Aotearoa by Chinese growers.
The starting point for this work was a rusty hybrid grubber-hoe that belonged to my father, which I kept after he passed away. I used it as the basis for developing the other tools. I was also influenced by the Ah Chee market garden tools in the archaeological collection at Auckland Museum, which I was able to study up close.
Today, the Ng King Brothers site – which housed up to 80 people in the 1940s and 1950s– is recognised by Heritage New Zealand Pouhere Taonga as a place of special cultural and historical significance. This artwork is currently included in the exhibition He Kapuka Oneone – A Handful of Soil at Christchurch Art Gallery Te Puna o Waiwhetū and features in the publication Whenua, produced in association with the exhibition.
After 25 years working in galleries and museums, including on more than 300 exhibitions (many at The Dowse Art Museum, where I was Collections and Touring Manager) I think of that time as a kind of apprenticeship. It gave me a strong grounding in how exhibitions come together, which I’ve drawn on in developing and touring my own work. I began making art during lockdown, and I feel very grateful to now be exhibiting and sharing my own stories.
To see Bev Moon's portfolio of work, see here https://www.bevmoon.com/
