Exhibitions
Events
On display
Colin McCahon: The Titirangi Years
Colin McCahon Kauri tree landscape 1956. Collection of Christchurch Art Gallery Te Puna o Waiwhetū, donated from the Canterbury Public Library Collection, 2001. Reproduced courtesy of Colin McCahon Research and Publication Trust
Oil on board
875 x 620mm
2002/177
Talk
Past event
Philip Carter Family Auditorium
Free
Academic, writer and curator Peter Simpson discusses Colin McCahon's move with his family from the South Island to a house in the bush at Titirangi in Auckland and the ground-breaking work he accomplished there.
Peter Simpson is the author of six non-fiction books, including Fantastica: The World of Leo Bensemann (2011), Patron and Painter: Charles Brasch and Colin McCahon (2010), Colin McCahon: The Titirangi Years 1953–1959 (2007) and Answering Hark: McCahon/Caselberg: Painter/Poet (2001). He previously lectured at Canterbury University and was head of English at the University of Auckland. He is also a co-founder and part-time director of the Holloway Press and was awarded the 2012 Creative New Zealand Michael King Writer’s Fellowship in 2012.
Related reading: Colin McCahon, Talk
Exhibition
From the Sun Deck: McCahon's Titirangi
17 September 2016 – 6 February 2017
Colin McCahon’s shift to Titirangi in 1953 was a watershed moment in the artist’s career, providing the inspiration for him to develop his interest in cubism and abstraction.
Exhibition
Bloomsbury South: The Arts in Christchurch 1933-1953
22 August – 5 September 2016
A selection of ephemera, books, sheet music and art brought together to mark the publication of Bloomsbury South: The Arts in Christchurch 1933-1953 by Peter Simpson.
Collection
Colin McCahon Kauri tree landscape
In 1958 poet and arts patron Charles Brasch, a great supporter of McCahon, said of the Titirangi works: 'These Auckland paintings seem an entirely new departure. The colour and light of Auckland are different from those of the rest of New Zealand; they are more atmospheric, they seem to have an independent, airy existence of their own, and they break up the uniform mass of solid bodies, hills or forests or water, into a kind of brilliant prismatic dance. Some of the paintings are explorations, evocations, of the kauri forest of the Waitakeres. In some you seem to be inside the forest, discovering the structure of individual trees, with their great shaft trunks, their balloon-like cones, and the shafts of light that play among them. In others you look at the forest from outside, as it rises like a wall before you, built up of cylinders and cubes of lighter and darker colour, with its wild jagged outlines against the sky.'
(From the Sun Deck: McCahon’s Titirangi, 17 September 2016 – 6 February 2017)
Collection
Colin McCahon Kauri tree landscape
In 1958 poet and arts patron Charles Brasch, a great supporter of McCahon, said of the Titirangi works: 'These Auckland paintings seem an entirely new departure. The colour and light of Auckland are different from those of the rest of New Zealand; they are more atmospheric, they seem to have an independent, airy existence of their own, and they break up the uniform mass of solid bodies, hills or forests or water, into a kind of brilliant prismatic dance. Some of the paintings are explorations, evocations, of the kauri forest of the Waitakeres. In some you seem to be inside the forest, discovering the structure of individual trees, with their great shaft trunks, their balloon-like cones, and the shafts of light that play among them. In others you look at the forest from outside, as it rises like a wall before you, built up of cylinders and cubes of lighter and darker colour, with its wild jagged outlines against the sky.'
(From the Sun Deck: McCahon’s Titirangi, 17 September 2016 – 6 February 2017)
film
Baxter and McCahon: a conversation
Two of the greats of the New Zealand art world – artist Colin McCahon and poet James K. Baxter – were friends. And fell out. As poet Gregory O’Brien says, 'They were such big spirits, I guess they couldn’t last that long in a room together.' O’Brien, Dr Paul Millar, author, professor of English and head of the School of Humanities at the University of Canterbury, and Dr Peter Simpson, writer, critic, academic and curator, are all experts on the work and personalities of these two men. On 6 March 2016 they got together before an audience at the Gallery for a fascinating discussion about Baxter and McCahon.
Notes
Canterbury Landscape by Colin McCahon
In 2014 we purchased an important landscape work by Colin McCahon. Curator Peter Vangioni speaks about this new addition to Christchurch Art Gallery’s collection.
Notes
‘Where the picture stops and the world begins’
The way a work of art is framed affects our perception of the piece. A bad frame can detract and distract, a good frame enhances and even extends a work. While the Gallery has been closed we have updated frames for a number of works in the collection.
Notes
Kauri tree landscape by Colin McCahon
This article first appeared as 'Mighty kauris inspired McCahon' in The Press on 10 February 2015.
Notes
as there is a constant flow of light
On a recent printer's residency at the Otago University's Otakou Press Colin McCahon's huge mural painting Waterfall Theme and variations dominated proceedings.
Notes
Light Passing Into a dark landscape
Today is the centennial of the death of one of New Zealand's most treasured artists, Petrus van der Velden.
Notes
There is only one direction by Colin McCahon
This article appeared as 'Divine Innovation' in the The Press on 31 August 2012.
Notes
As there is a constant flow of light we are born into the pure land
After many, many months in the 'Darkness' of the empty gallery, I can think of no better words than those of Colin McCahon to signify the opening of the new gallery shop at 40 Lichfield Street.
Drop in Mon-Fri 10am-5pm, 10am-4pm Weekends
See you all soon!
Notes
O'Reilly/McCahon: an Easter meditation
An Easter-themed excerpt from an article published in 2010 in The Journal of New Zealand Art History...
Notes
Sutton high-fives McCahon
Nothing made it into a W.A. Sutton painting by accident, and the white line that rises diagonally through the sky in Plantation Series II is no exception.