1969 was a watershed year for Ralph Hotere. It was the year he was awarded the Frances Hodgkins Fellowship at the University of Otago, which led to his permanent move to Dunedin and Port Chalmers. Black Painting is not only one of the first purely abstract paintings to enter the collection, it is also the first painting by a Māori artist to be acquired. In Hotere’s enigmatic series of Black Paintings from 1968 and 1969, pinstripe circles or lines pierce the void of the dark backgrounds. Black Painting was acquired from the 1969 Group Show in Christchurch by Muir, who had studied under Hotere in Auckland during the mid-1960s.

(1969 Comeback Special 27 August – 6 November 2016)

A poem by Bill Manhire was the inspiration for this series of paintings. It repeated the words ‘malady’, ‘melody’ and ‘my lady’ and the repetition, simplicity and strong emotion of the poem appealed to Ralph Hotere. ‘Melody’ and ‘malady’ come together in ‘my lady’, suggesting that deep-felt love can be both a sickness and a delight.

The fine circles in the paintings suggest the fragility of love, and their intense colour celebrates its beauty. Hotere made several works based on this poem during the early 1970s.

Hotere was born in Taikarawa, Northland, and was widely regarded as one of New Zealand’s greatest living artists. He is represented in public and private collections throughout New Zealand. He lived at Port Chalmers near Dunedin.

Ralph Hotere’s Requiem Series of paintings of 1973–74 refers to the Catholic mass for the dead and his use of dark, subdued tones throughout the series imbues a sense of contemplative reflection. In this related drawing, flowing watercolour washes are overlaid with precisely executed pinstripe lines of paint creating a striking contrast between the spontaneous and the orderly.

Hotere (of Aupouri descent) was born in Taikarawa, in Northland. A New Zealand Art Societies Fellowship Scholarship in 1961 enabled him to travel to London to study at the Central School of Art. He also travelled extensively throughout Europe. Hotere returned to New Zealand in 1965 and from 1969 was based in Dunedin. His work dealt with environmental issues, politics, poetry, religion, colonialism and racism. The Arts Foundation of New Zealand listed him as an inaugural Icon Artist in 2003.

In te reo Māori, Aramoana means ‘pathway to the sea’. It’s also a small settlement on the Otago Peninsula, near where Ralph Hotere had his studio – and where Hotere and fellow artist Bill Culbert protested against the building of an aluminium smelter, which they were concerned would degrade the harbour. The two were great friends, and Culbert would return to Aotearoa New Zealand most years from his home in Europe (usually during Bluff oyster season) to collaborate on large-scale sculptural works with Hotere. This suite of lithographs extends the ideas of one of Hotere and Culbert’s earliest sculptural collaborations, also titled Pathway to the Sea – Aramoana. It features the glasses of wine they enjoyed together, the pāua shells and fluorescent tubes of the installation work, and questions about place and personal identity.

(Te Wheke, 2020)