Leo Bensemann Rita Angus 1938. Pencil on paper. Collection of Christchurch Art Gallery Te Puna o Waiwhetū 2014
Rita Angus Irises 1942. Watercolour. Collection of Christchurch Art Gallery Te Puna o Waiwhetū, Lawrence Baigent/Robert Erwin bequest 2003. Reproduced courtesy of the estate of Rita Angus
Zina Swanson Some People's Plants Never Flower … 2007. Mixed media - glass, wood, organic material. Collection of Christchurch Art Gallery Te Puna o Waiwhetū 2007, purchased with the support of Coffey Projects
Frances Hodgkins Houses and Outhouses, Purbeck 1938. Oil on canvas. On loan from the British Council Collection, London
This exhibition is now closed
Three influential female artists united by talent, tenacity and self-belief.
Virginia Woolf wrote of the need for a figurative space of privacy and concentration, free from interruption, family responsibilities and financial constraints. Artists Rita Angus, Frances Hodgkins and Louise Henderson were well aware of the need to safeguard themselves from the derailments of societal expectation. Each required talent, tenacity, self-belief and good fortune to sustain her career, and together they created valuable precedents for those who followed.
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Date:
18 December 2015 – 29 May 2016 -
Curator:
Felicity Milburn -
Exhibition number:
995
Collection works in this exhibition
Related reading: A Room of One’s Own, exhibition-995
Notes
Rita Angus by Leo Bensemann
This article first appeared in The Press as 'Viewing Rita Angus with Leo's eyes' on 26 May 2015
Notes
Irises by Rita Angus
This article first appeared as 'The meticulous small world of Rita Angus' in The Press on 9 December 2014.
Notes
Raise your glass (house)
Huge congratulations to Zina Swanson who has just been announced as the Francis Hodgkins Fellow for 2013.
Notes
People in glasshouses
A few days ago, there were lots of little bits of glass and metal strewn (in a highly systematic way) across the floor of our NG gallery space.
Notes
Zipp by Frances Hodgkins
‘I can't tell you the horror of the Blackout and the effects on your nerves - the want of ventilation at night is very tiring - perhaps the nastiest part of it all.' - Frances Hodgkins in a letter to her brother, William.
Collection
Zina Swanson Untitled
Zina Swanson’s precise, yet poetic painted drawings call attention to the delicacy and vulnerability of nature. Plant matter, insects and other tiny objects she collected over several years take fresh life in brushstrokes that range from feathery to forensically precise. Zina’s interest in her personal – and our human – relationship with the natural world led her to imagine a strange form of cross-species rehabilitation, where wilting forms are supported, a cutting grows the feet of a bird and processed timber receives new prosthetic roots. Her latest painting recounts an early foray into collecting, when she salvaged a discarded stick so large it had to be cut into three and reassembled in her studio. In an associated poem, she wrote: Making them part of my life, by making them part of my paintings Making a special shelf for them in my studio The collection keeps growing.
(Perilous: Unheard Stories from the Collection, 6 August 2022- )
Collection
Zina Swanson Untitled
Zina Swanson’s precise, yet poetic painted drawings call attention to the delicacy and vulnerability of nature. Plant matter, insects and other tiny objects she collected over several years take fresh life in brushstrokes that range from feathery to forensically precise. Zina’s interest in her personal – and our human – relationship with the natural world led her to imagine a strange form of cross-species rehabilitation, where wilting forms are supported, a cutting grows the feet of a bird and processed timber receives new prosthetic roots. Her latest painting recounts an early foray into collecting, when she salvaged a discarded stick so large it had to be cut into three and reassembled in her studio. In an associated poem, she wrote: Making them part of my life, by making them part of my paintings Making a special shelf for them in my studio The collection keeps growing.
(Perilous: Unheard Stories from the Collection, 6 August 2022- 21 July 2024)