Join us at Artspace Aotearoa to celebrate the launch of The Purpose of the Space Is What It Does: Five Notes from Aotearoa, a new publication initiated by Jingcheng Zhao, bringing together arts practitioners across Aotearoa who are constructing space on their own terms.

The publication takes its title from a prompt first offered by artists Nathan Joe and Bea Gladding during a workshop under GAMER: Night School, one of the programmes developed during Jingcheng Zhao’s curatorial internship at Artspace Aotearoa. The prompt became the seed for continued exploration within and beyond the internship.

A space can be physical, but it is also relational, emotional, practical and ongoing. The publication contributors looked at ‘community’ through actions of community: the curator as accompanist; growing food as cultural sovereignty; learning about curatorial work through its contradictions; the bookstore as a site of collective cultural life.

Contributors include Bea Gladding, Balamohan Shingade, Soil of Cultures, Jingcheng Zhao and Nowhere Aotearoa.

This project is funded through the Asian Artist Fund 2025 and made possible through the support of Artspace Aotearoa, Satellites, Foundation North, Creative New Zealand and Auckland Council.