Piecing together Warhol history


One hundred people gathered together, jostled and bumped each other, and made some patchwork artwork today to launch Te Papa’s latest exhibition.

The artwork – images of Sir Peter Jackson and TVNZ Seven Sharp presenter Alison Mau – were held up by 100 people who had been brought together by social media.

Museum assistant director Karen Mason said it was a complicated operation, but was an opportunity to bring the public into the exhibition.

”It’s more complicated than you think to get it working. It’s a different version of herding cats.

”It’s part of our social media campaign for the Warhol exhibition. We wanted to create events people could participate in.

”This was a way of starting the conversation around Warhol. He was an artist that brought people together with things he called ‘happenings’ – so we’ve created our own.”

The event kicked off just after 1pm, with Mau first – for a TVNZ segment on her show tonight – and then Jackson.

Though patchy, viewed from a height the images fairly represented their subjects. The artwork was done in Warhol’s style.

Hannah Varnell, 23, said it was ”rad” to take part in the event.

”I had the eye, the right eye I think. Everyone was laughing, it was all around a cool time.”

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