The year 1984 is forever associated with images of Big Brother and the decline of democracy due to George Orwell's anti-communist novel 1984. While the reality was not quite as dire as Orwell had feared it would be, it was nonetheless a watershed year, both locally and globally. Internationally, the tensions between Russia and the American President Ronald Reagan were increasingly stretched, a famine of epidemic proportions was raging through Ethiopia, and the constant conflicts in Beirut and Kosovo left most of the Western world more than a little uneasy. Closer to home, New Zealand was suffering through the last vestiges of Robert Muldoon's controversial government and his disastrous handling of the currency crisis. Significantly, it was a period when New Zealanders were fiercely debating the issue of nuclear power, a matter that would ultimately lead to one of the defining moments for New Zealand as a nation.It is in this broader climate that Ralph Hotere created his work Nineteen-Eighty-Four, a painting from the Polaris series. The motivation behind the series came from sources both international and personal. In 1984, the nuclear-powered ship POLARIS visited New Zealand, bringing the threat of devastation by nuclear warheads closer to being a reality. In his personal life, Hotere had taken a trip to Europe in the early 1960s, visiting the grave site of his brother who was killed while serving as a member of the WWII Maori Battalion. This experience moved him deeply and spawned the Polaris and the Sangro series in 1962. He was politically active in environmental and social issues, both local and international, and his beliefs were inevitably translated into his works. This work, comprised of steel, paper and acrylic, is typical of his works from the early 1980s. Bound in a Roger Hicken driftwood frame (Hicken's initials are carved on top), Nineteen-Eighty-Four is also part of Hotere's window series, a group of works that explore the various preconceived notions of the inherent function of a window. Typically, a window is a vehicle for exposing the outside world; however, Hotere's windows tend to both obscure and reflect rather than to reveal. Here the polished steel is partially obscured by three blocks of paper applied to the centre of the work. The strong compositional element, the clear shape, is the stylised shape of the Polaris missile. The scratched steel and paper juxtapose a rough texture with the smooth fluidity of the polished steel, which is permitted only to mirror the periphery. If the viewer is standing directly in front of the work, it is possible to see only images reflected along the fringe. For the majority of New Zealanders, the way forward was clear, and this work makes a powerful anti-nuclear statement.
Emma Fox