What’s On
Robin White: Te Whanaketanga | Something Is Happening Here
A major survey of the career of one of Aotearoa New Zealand’s best-loved artists.
Te Rā: The Māori Sail
Now on display at Te Puna o Waiwhetū!
Ship Nails and Tail Feathers
The stories told by rare, extravagant – and even curiously ordinary – objects.
Open 7 days, 10am - 5pm
Late night Wednesday until 9pm
Free entry, free wifi
Commentary
Te Wheke: Pathways Across Oceania
Every few years, the curatorial team at Christchurch Art Gallery Te Puna o Waiwhetū embarks on a major rehang of the first-floor collection area. It’s no small undertaking finding fresh ways to combine long-held, well-known works and new acquisitions, looking for combinations that will offer compelling viewing, immersive storytelling and intellectual engagement to our wide and evolving visitor base. This time, director Blair Jackson added another dimension to our task, challenging us to reimagine the physical orientation of the spaces to encourage visitors to interact with the architecture in a completely different way.
Exhibition
Graham Bennett: Seeking a Balance
Highlights from a wide-ranging sculptural practice shaped by curiosity and connection.
Notes
Hemispheres
I’ve had this little untitled sculpture by Clare Noonan on the same wall in my home for more than 15 years. It might even be the first thing I hung there, since we’ve had our house about that long. I bought it at a fundraiser for the High Street Project, and I’ve always loved it, for reasons I find hard to explain. Sometimes, it suggests a new way to think about the world; in others, it feels like a reminder of something I already know.
Notes
Puta Noa I Te Ao / In the World
Artists from Aotearoa New Zealand are often well-travelled. Feeling the distance of Aotearoa from the world’s centres of art, they have often been drawn overseas to study and work, contributing to the art history of their adopted countries as well as this one.
Notes
He Toka Tū Moana
The Māori whakataukī or proverb “He toka tū moana” uses the image of a rock that stands firmly in the ocean to describe someone steadfast and strong in their culture or beliefs, who defies all opposition.
Notes
Hand-washing
As we all know, one of the best ways to prevent the spread of Covid-19 is washing our hands. For the last week or so, our wonderful librarian Tim Jones supplied all the bathrooms at Christchurch Art Gallery Te Puna o Waiwhetū with poems by New Zealand poets to make the recommended 2-minute handwashing sessions pass a little more bearably.
Now we are all working from home, we'll try to keep this going, starting with a reading of On First Looking into Chapman's Homer by John Keats, the poem behind Michael Parekowhai's sculpture. Tim himself is the reader.
Press play and start washing.
Exhibition
Francis Upritchard: Paper, Creature, Stone
A major new installation fired by collaboration and connection.
Commentary
Power and Possibility
Jonathan Jones, art critic for the Guardian newspaper, described it as “a spectacle that displays the power and mystery of our planet”. Made more than forty years ago, Walter De Maria’s 1977 sculpture The Lightning Field remains one of the world’s most ambitious manifestations of light-based art.
Commentary
Her Own London
I laughed at your note. Our packing was not done until the last minute of the 11th hour, and when we at last got onto the train we could only think how lovely it was to do nothing and think about nothing. However, by now we realise we are really going to England. After 17 days at sea, out of sight of land, N.Z. seems as if it was in another universe.