All-in-One Luxury Sponge brings Emily Hartley-Skudder and Victoria McIntosh together for an apricot-hued exhibition of sculpture and painting. With a keen observation of the ordinary objects we surround ourselves with, Emily and Victoria first bonded over a shared obsession with kitsch and ‘collecting’ (ahem, hoarding). Sharing an astute attention to materials and a fastidious relationship to their respective crafts, the artists both manipulate and re-present everyday objects which are intertwined with the human body and domesticity. 

A key motif in the show is a sickly sweet, peach-coloured microwave cake mould, proudly labelled with the brand name ‘Defiance’. Victoria spies these regularly in her weekly op-shop excursions around Ōtepoti. Circa 1980s, they were sold in Australian and New Zealand supermarkets complete with two packets of all-in-one cake ‘micro-mix’. Warning—these were only to be used in the microwave. Blending ingredients of humour, feminism, domesticity and materiality, Luxury Sponge presents a gloriously tactile buffet for all to indulge in.

Emily Hartley-Skudder (b. 1988, Tāmaki Makaurau) is a visual artist living in Te Whanganui-a-Tara, Wellington. Known for her paintings, assemblages and site-specific installations which delve into the artificial ordinary and faux domestic, she graduated with a Bachelor of Fine Arts (First Class Honours) from Ilam School of Fine Arts, University of Canterbury in 2012. Emily has exhibited in solo and group exhibitions throughout Aotearoa and internationally, including at a number of Ōtautahi and Te Whanganui-a-Tara galleries, Gus Fisher Gallery, Hastings City Art Gallery, The Suter Art Gallery, and Dunedin Public Art Gallery. She has participated in shows in Australia, Japan, China and the USA. In 2023, Emily was the Frances Hodgkins Fellow and Molly Morpeth Canaday Major Award Winner.

Victoria McIntosh is based in her hometown Ōtepoti, Victoria stitches together contemporary jewellery, sculpture and assemblage. A collector by nature, she is drawn to objects that carry a sense of history, whether real or imagined. Her practice combines vintage textiles and metalware to explore ideas around adoption, body image and autonomy. Victoria has graduated twice from the Dunedin School of Art, firstly in 1991 with a DFA in printmaking and again in 2005, with a BFA in Jewellery and Metalsmithing. Victoria was the Caselberg Artist in Residence, 2017. She has exhibited throughout Aotearoa and abroad, including Schmuck 2016. Victoria’s work is held in the collections of Te Papa Tongarewa, The Dowse Art Museum, Tāmaki Paenga Hira Auckland Museum, Tūhura Otago Museum and Uare Taoka o Hākena Hocken Collection.