No Questions Asked

Drypoint and Relief on paper
882 x 1160mm framed
Edition 4/12

Also available unframed - $5000

No Questions Asked shows Huia specimens wrapped in newspaper and discovered in a central London antiques market in the early hours of the morning — in the 1960’s it was a place operating without oversight, where before dawn, anything can be sold with its source or provenance not obliged to be revealed or conversely, questioned.

The work draws on an account involving the celebrated New Zealand painter Raymond Ching, who is said to have encountered Huia specimens, long after the species was officially recorded as extinct. Whether factual or apocryphal, the story reflects the uncertainty and mythology surrounding vanished species. The specimens are described as retaining an unusual lustre, inconsistent with the accepted date of the birds extinction, further unsettling the historical record.

There are ambiguities surrounding the Huia’s disappearance, which include the activities of Wellington taxidermist, Clarence Poynter who is associated with the capture, mounting and sale of specimens post extinction. These histories sit at the edge of documentation, shaped by rumour and incomplete record.

The birds are wrapped in pages of The Dominion, grounding the image in a specific site of reportage and linking it to shifting relationships between evidence, absence, and memory.