Someplace Else - A Book (2021)
“I had just wanted to go - perhaps like many other New Zealanders. And anywhere, I wasn’t too fussed. A pull to go “overseas”.
‘Someplace Else’ is a book project in response to recent border closures. This crafted first edition publication brings together drawings and recollections of travel between Hungary and New Zealand from 1991 - 2019. Travel ephemera such as airplane tickets, bus passes and museum entries prompted a long-term project. The intimate works on paper use collage, stitching, mark-making and pin-pricking.
The book highlights tensions of a trans-national relationship split between two places - between home and overseas, between foreigner and resident, between tourist and citizen. A familiar situation for many New Zealanders. Home, belonging and outsider-ness are constant themes in her practice, which is indelibly shaped by her upbringing in the Solomon Islands.
‘Someplace Else’ was made possible by the generous support of Creative New Zealand.
‘Someplace Else’ is a DINZ Best Awards 2021 Bronze Award Winner.
“A lavish handbound artist’s book by Louise Stevenson concerning her decades of drifting repeatedly between Aotearoa New Zealand and Hungary—is a particularly vivid example of something many of us have probably thought about doing: a collection of the scintillating ephemera of travel preserved to look back on as we might a photo album.” — Chris Holdaway, “On Louise Stevenson’s ‘Someplace Else’ ”, essay for Contemporary HUM
“Someplace Else speaks to everyone who has ever been or dreamed of being elsewhere. Each item in Stevenson’s carefully considered collection of sculptural ephemera is loaded with meaning, calling on the viewer’s own experience of being on the move in unchartered territory, whether that be a new country or new experience in their lives.” — Chloe Geoghegan, Curator, Te Uru Waitakere Contemporary Gallery
“The crafted book, designed by Katie Kerr, is true to it’s title - it’s transportative” — HERE, issue 6, 2021
Designed by PANZ Book Design Award winner Katie Kerr, signed first edition copies of “Someplace Else” are available to buy.
Someplace Else
$79.95