Kā Kaupapa o te Wā
What’s On
Taniwha Talks: Artist Kōrero
Join artists Lisa Reihana, Maungarongo Te Kawa, Francine Spencer, Kahurangiariki Smith and Madison Kelly for a lively kōrero.
Whāia te Taniwha Book Launch
Bring your whānau and join the writers of our new pukapuka as they read excerpts from their taniwha tales.
Te Pō Taniwha
It’s party time. Celebrate the opening of Whāia te Taniwha with a night of music and kai.
E tuwhera ana te wharetoi i kā rā e 7 o te wiki, 10am - 5pm
Ka tuwhera ki te 9pm i kā pō Wenerei
Open 7 days, 10am - 5pm
Late night Wednesday until 9pm
Uruka utukore, ahokore utukore
Free entry, free wifi
Collection
Clare Leighton Resting
Much of Clare Leighton’s work as a wood engraver focused on rural labourers going about their lives in the countryside. These works were used extensively as illustrations in her popular books on country life during the 1930s, including The Farmers Year (1933), Four Hedges: A Gardener’s Chronicle (1935) and Country Matters (1937). The skill of Leighton’s wood engraving is evident in this work, where her exquisite and delicately cut lines create incredibly soft tonal variations. The subject is drawn from her time spent in a lumber camp on Canada’s Quebec-Ontario border. One of the most important manuals on wood engraving remains Leighton’s 'Wood-engraving and Woodcuts' from 1938.
The Golden Age 18 December 2015 – 1 May 2016
Collection
Clare Leighton Threshing
Clare Leighton was a distinguished wood engraver in both England and America. Her parents, the popular fiction writers Marie Connor and Robert Leighton, influenced her to write and illustrate her own books. The two woodblocks shown here appear in her first book, The Farmer’s Year: A Calendar of English Husbandry, published in 1933. The Farmer’s Year illustrates the twelve months of the year on the Buckinghamshire farm where Leighton was living. These wood engravings illustrate threshing in March and apple-picking in September.
Leighton said: “Getting to know the farmers and working with them, I learned the pattern of the year as I shared the shepherds hut at lambing time. I stooked the grain at harvest and climbed ladders to pick apples. I had come home.” Leighton felt a great connection to rural life, finding this a more honest way of living than what workers experienced in the city. This outlook was similar to that of the earlier French realists such as Jean-François Millet, who created celebratory depictions of farm life at a time when many people were leaving the countryside and moving to urban areas.
(Leaving for Work, 2 October 2021 - 1 May 2022)
Collection
John Farleigh Hemlock
The beautiful forms and shapes of a humble weed are given centre stage in this wood engraving by John Farleigh. He had a natural empathy with the wood engraving medium, as can be seen in this work with its delicate lines and contrasting areas of black and white in the background. In his role as lecturer in the book production department at London’s Central School of Arts and Crafts in the 1920s he encouraged many artists to work with the medium. He illustrated numerous books and produced an important manual on wood engraving for students titled Engraving on Wood (1954).
Describing the process, Farleigh once stated:
The tool has a subtle voice. It will only confide in the understanding craftsman. […] It can become the only living thing about you. All feeling and life; all action and intensity can pass into the tool until the body clouds up and only the point of the tool is in focus. It is then that the tool will talk and all is well.
The Golden Age 18 December 2015 – 1 May 2016
Collection
Eric Gill Carrying of the Cross
Eric Gill was one of the most prominent and energetic proponents of wood engraving during its revival in England during the 1920s. His training as a sculptor put him in good stead for the medium: scale aside, carving an uncut piece of stone is not dissimilar to carving the surface of a wood engraving block. Gill excelled as a wood engraver. He was one of the most prolific of his generation, and his work illustrated many private press publications. In this work, Gill's strong, hard-edged lines cut directly from the wood engraving block, reflect his training as a sulptuor and highlights his unique style. It was included as an illustration in Passio Domini Nostri Jesu Christi, published by the Golden Cockerel Press in 1926.