My Favourite
My Favourite
Rita Angus – Cass
A few years ago, I walked the old Ngāi Tahu trails through Kā Tiritiri-o-te-moana The Southern Alps. I was hunting for traces of our pre-European history in the mountains. I encountered a lot of Pākehā mountain history as well. In the upper Waimakariri Basin, on my way to Tarahaka Arthur’s Pass, I wandered into New Zealand’s greatest painting – as seen on TV.
My Favourite
Marti Friedlander – Margaret Mahy
Marti Friedlander is my favourite Aotearoa photographer. I don’t remember the first time I saw one of her photographs, but they always feel familiar and give me a sense of warm nostalgia. Her work captures a time in New Zealand I miss – primary school cheekiness, shopping on a Saturday morning, travelling to family farms in Timaru and North Canterbury. A simpler life.
My Favourite
Jason Greig's Vulcan Paradise
I’ve had a quiet fascination with Jason Greig’s work ever since I was a Year 13 student hanging about Burnside High’s art block (which, granted, wasn’t that long ago). My then printmaking teacher, Nichola Shanley, is a good friend of Jason’s and managed to get him along to one of our classes.
My Favourite
Cerith Wyn Evans's Things are conspicuous in their absence...
I have never seen an artwork reflect something so true. “Things are conspicuous in their absence” is such an uncommonly heard reflection that it is eye-catching. When things are around us, they seem normal and often go unnoticed; the moment they are gone it can be startling and we wake up.
My Favourite
Peter Stichbury's NDE
Anna Worthington chooses her favourite work from the Gallery collection.
My Favourite
Shane Cotton's Takarangi
I grew up in the Motueka Valley at a place called Ngatimoti. The Peninsula Bridge crosses the Motueka river there. It carries one lane on a timber deck joining SH 61 to Peninsula Road and the west bank of the river. The bridge is 110 years old, still doing its job of daring every kid who grows up in its vicinity to climb the railing and take the leap one day – maybe thirty feet if the summer is hot and the river sedate and inviting. By the time I’m sixteen, I’m a veteran. Veterans don’t jump. We dive, head first, eyes open, arms outstretched. There must be grace in the art of falling.
My Favourite
Robert Herdman-Smith's Framed Presentation to Hugh Duncanson Buchanan
I’m often drawn to art that’s attached to a specific time and place, and so it was that I came across Robert Herdman-Smith’s beautiful piece – commissioned in honour of the departure from Little River of a wealthy landowner (Hugh Duncanson Buchanan) in 1908. Behind the intricately carved wooden frame, the tiny perfect lettering embellished with paintings and art nouveau-ish decorations, is a story that I’d like to know more about.
My Favourite
Pauline Rhodes – Land Extensums, Banks Peninsula
I only have to set a direction towards Horomaka Banks Peninsula, and I feel an energy, a charge. The ritual of a takeaway coffee at Wairewa Little River. A flicker of shadows from the centenary lime trees lining the road at Cooptown. Picking up speed to begin the swinging ascent to the Crater Rim. A rush of air, sweeping up over the summit and along the wide expanse of the Peninsula, hilltops encircling a traveller like comforting arms.
My Favourite
Jacqueline Fahey's Mother and daughter quarrelling
I first encountered Jacqueline Fahey’s Mother and daughter quarrelling (1977)—in reproduced form—in Art History class during my final year at Shirley Boys’ High. We’d just entered the new millennium and at some point amid that final year our entire form group lost access to our senior common room for a week because a couple of boys had sellotaped a selection of pages from some off-brand Penthouse onto the roll-up projector screen that hung from the ceiling. That’s just to give you an idea of the prevalent gender politics of the time and place.