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Dead Reckoning
17 January - 17 February 2019

Megan Brady and Oliver Perkins


The Physics Room
Ōtautahi, Christchurch
Aotearoa, NZ


Click here and here for more information

The prime number few, 2019. Memory foam. Installation view (detail).



The prime number few, 2019. Memory foam. Installation view (detail).



The prime number few, 2019. Memory foam. Installation view (detail).


In Dead Reckoning, Megan Brady and Oliver Perkins directly address the site of The Physics Room’s temporary home within the Christchurch Art Gallery, Te Puna O Waiwhetū via two large-scale interventions.

In the terminology of navigation, ‘dead reckoning’ is a process of orienting oneself using the visual signs of the immediate surroundings without a compass or other wayfinding device. How does this occur in The Physics Room’s current site: a gallery within a gallery? The artists consider this space as both a destination and as a thoroughfare for a potentially more obvious destination—especially in these tourist-heavy summer months—two quite distinct environments to negotiate.

Perkins’ Painting for the Clarification of Internal Architecture and Institutional Identity (PCIAII) borrows from the language of the public mural. Painting directly onto the hallway windows between the Worcester Boulevard entrance and the Christchurch Art Gallery’s Design Store, Perkins has reversed the original architectural intention; transforming transparency to opacity. His intervention is a distant cousin of the whitewashed shop front, though the sentiment is still murmured by the visible marks of the roller.

Frequently seduced by the subtleties of our surroundings, Megan Brady’s practice explores ideas around intention, interaction, and navigation. Through contemplating the transitory nature of our public spaces, she collects and celebrates the soft details of these environments. Looking for ways to distract those whose presence within The Physics Room is somewhat accidental, Brady proposes an alternative route employing soft sculpture and sound to slow navigation and induce contemplation—not only of the work inhabiting the gallery, but of the space itself.

Click to listen to Art, Not Science Episode 8
An artist talk with Megan Brady and Oliver Perkins on their exhibition Dead Reckoning.


The prime number few, 2019. Paint (Influential). Installation view (details).



The prime number few, 2019. Memory foam. Installation view.


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