Hannah Valentine

  • Knowing hands, yesterday and tomorrow (mother and child)
  • Knowing hands, yesterday and tomorrow (mother and child)
  • Knowing hands, yesterday and tomorrow (mother and child)
  • Knowing hands, yesterday and tomorrow (mother and child)
  • Knowing hands, yesterday and tomorrow (mother and child)
  • Knowing hands, yesterday and tomorrow (mother and child)
  • Knowing hands, yesterday and tomorrow (mother and child)
  • Knowing hands, yesterday and tomorrow (mother and child)
  • Knowing hands, yesterday and tomorrow (mother and child)
  • Knowing hands, yesterday and tomorrow (mother and child)
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Knowing hands, yesterday and tomorrow (mother and child) 2023
Cast bronze and stainless steel
2020 mm x 1330 mm x 695 mm

This work is formed from impressions of the artist’s hands, reflecting on how we come to understand the world physically — through touch, movement and the body.

Made while hapū with her second child, it considers the relationship between mother and child, and the ways knowledge is shaped and passed on across generations.

Its open, rising form suggests both the body and natural growth,
allowing it to shift between figurative and more abstract readings.
Beginning in clay and transformed into bronze, the work retainsthe
trace of touch — gestures and impressions held in a permanent form.

Set within a subtle clearing, the work is encountered in passing, with morning light drawing out its shifting forms.

The artist notes

“I’m interested in the way we understand the world around us physically, and how that might be changing, with our hands being a fundamental source of knowledge.” 

 

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Knowing hands, yesterday and tomorrow (mother and child)
Knowing hands, yesterday and tomorrow (mother and child)
Knowing hands, yesterday and tomorrow (mother and child)
Knowing hands, yesterday and tomorrow (mother and child)
Knowing hands, yesterday and tomorrow (mother and child)
Knowing hands, yesterday and tomorrow (mother and child)
Knowing hands, yesterday and tomorrow (mother and child)
Knowing hands, yesterday and tomorrow (mother and child)
Knowing hands, yesterday and tomorrow (mother and child)
Knowing hands, yesterday and tomorrow (mother and child)

More from this artist

Artist Bio

Hannah Valentine (b. 1989, Tāmaki Makaurau Auckland) is an artist who lives and works between Auckland and Melbourne. She earned a Master of Fine Arts with Honours from Elam School of Fine Arts, University of Auckland, in 2017. 

Hannah Valentine's practice follows two distinct threads. The first is an interest in the body and tactile sensibilities. If we are being conditioned away from sensibility, towards consumerism, she questions how we might reinvigorate feeling and its importance in the way we interact with the world and each other. The second thread, which feels more pressing than ever, is concern for our environment and impending climate crises. Hannah’s work takes form primarily in object, installation and documentary style film.

She has exhibited widely, with recent shows including "Looking in, Breathing Out" at Enjoy Public Art Gallery, Wellington (2018), and "Grips, slips, of space, a memory" at Te Tuhi, Auckland (2016–2017).

In 2022, Valentine was awarded the Supreme Award at the Miles Art Awards. Beyond her studio practice, Valentine co-directed the artist-run space LOFT Jervois from 2014 to 2015 and was a member of the RM Collective between 2018 and 2021.