Artist Eve Armstrong investigates systems of exchange, waste and recycling to reveal differing attitudes towards the materials, use and value of objects.

Armstrong says ‘I’ve always worked with things that are already in the world. It makes sense to use what’s there.’ Her works are formed through researching, collecting and re-constructing ‘rubbish’ and found materials. Armstrong is also known for iterations of Trading Table, a participatory public work where she ‘trades’ with passers-by, exchanging objects, skills, ideas and information.

In these collages, Armstrong plays with small-scale images of domestic objects, making arrangements she denotes as ‘accidental formalism.’

Eve Armstrong (born 1978, Upper Hutt) graduated with the Senior Scholarship from Elam School of Fine Arts, Auckland University in 2003. She has exhibited widely since, and undertaken a 5-year project with The Dowse, Lower Hutt. In 2006, Armstrong received the Arts Foundation of New Zealand New Generation Award, undertook an Asia New Zealand Foundation artist residency, and participated in Christchurch’s SCAPE Biennial and South Korea’s Busan Biennale. Armstrong has featured in the 3rd Auckland Triennial 2007, Australia’s Tarrawarra Biennial 2008, undertaken Auckland’s McCahon House Artist Residency, 2009, and shown a major installation at Dunedin Art Gallery as a 2017 residency project. Armstrong lives and works in Wellington.