LA Botanical: Joyce Campbell

The distance between Wairoa and Los Angeles is vast, yet artist Joyce Campbell is building a bridge between in the two in her latest series of photography LA Botanical.

Campbell is a true Hawke’s Bay success story in the contemporary art world. Born in Wairoa, her distinctive work as a photographer has brought her worldwide attention.

She now divides her time between Auckland where she is a lecturer at Elam School of Fine Art at the University of Auckland, and Los Angeles which continues to provide the inspiration for her current series of artwork.

The LA Botanical series is an ongoing project in which Campbell is attempting to document each plant that grows in Los Angeles for which she can find a documented use for.

Few of the plants are native to Los Angeles – an arid region – so by identifying them Campbell is also identifying the people who brought the plants, valued them and nurtured them.

The series also offers some reflection on Campbell’s upbringing in Wairoa “The project is an attempt to reconcile my own rural background with my life in Los Angeles, one of the most sprawling and unsustainable metropolis’ on earth”.

Event listed by HB Museum And Art Gallery

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