Tag: art

John Daly-Peoples

Aotearoa Art Fair April 30 – May 3

At the end of the April, for four days the Aotearoa Art Fair will once again take over the Viaduct Events Centre on Auckland’s waterfront.

For four days, the Viaduct Events Centre will be New Zealand’s most exciting cultural destination with 60 leading galleries presenting work by more than two hundred artists. The works on display will feature painting, sculpture, photography, ceramics, installation art and more. The galleries presenting work are from leading galleries throughout New Zealand as well as major galleries from Australia.

This is the ideal venue for first time collectors as well as those expanding their collections. It is also a chance to hear experts and seasoned collectors talking about art including a session on starting an art collection or art collective featuring Phillida Perry (Kunst Art Group), Christine Fernyhough (Prospect Art Group – New Zealand’s first Art Group), and collector Anna Dickie (Artichoke Art Group).

There are a number of Artists Talks including Yuki Kihara, the New Zealand representative for the 2022 Venice Biennale, talking about the impetus behind her sculpture series ‘Dresstories’, featured at the Aotearoa Art Fair. ‘Dresstories’ references photographs of unknown Sāmoan women taken by the late 19th century NZ colonial photographer Thomas Andrew.

There is also New Zealand-born, Melbourne-based artist Richard Lewer for a first-hand insight into his latest body of work, a compendium of fifty paintings. Offering a snapshot – and social commentary – of our world in 2026, this deeply personal yet collectively resonant body of work, captures the good, the bad and the ugly.

Lissy & Rudi Robinson-Cole will be talking with Nigel Borell talking about their artworks which explore mātauranga Māori and the importance of ancestral knowledge through crocheted woollen sculpture. To date the artists’ largest and most ambitious project has been Wharenui Harikoa (House of Joy), a full-size crocheted meeting house created. They will talk about the boundaries between craft, object art and conventional fine arts at present.

Galleries presenting work by New Zealand and Australian galleries

Sanderson

Simon Kaan, Marama Series IV, 2026

Ink and oil on board

1250 x 950 (h) mm

$14,000

For Aotearoa Art Fair 2026 Simon Kaan has created a new series of Marama paintings. Made in his studio in an intense period following a close friend passing away the series explores the interplay of light, darkness, and spiritual symbolism, drawing on the Māori concept of the Marama (the moon) as a guiding force that is comforting and ever-present. Through layered textures and subtle tonal shifts, the works evoke a contemplative atmosphere that reflects both the natural rhythms of life and our inner emotional worlds.

Freeman White, Sonata, 2026

Oil on linen

370 x 270 mm

$3750

For the Aotearoa Art Fair 2026 Freeman White has created a new series of dynamic seascape paintings capturing the shifting moods of the ocean. Using layered brushstrokes and subtle colour transitions the works explore the power and tranquillity of the sea. The artworks emphasize the interplay of light and water, creating scenes that feel both animated and harmonious. Several of the paintings began as en plein air studies, described by White as ‘physical embodiments’ of his memories of place, executed in situ to provide a ‘deeper understanding’ of the subject. Some of these studies are included in this body of work.  

Parker Contemporary

Melissa J Harvey
Pride (from The Guardians series), 2025
Scuptie stainless steel and concrete
Dimensions variable
$480 NZD

Developed during a residency at the renowned Morgan Conservatory in the United States, Pride forms part of Melissa J Harvey’s Guardians series, a body of work drawn from recurring dream imagery. In this work, the guardian appears as a watchful presence, reflecting themes of protection, instinct and transformation.

Claudia Husband
Penumbra Drift III, 2025
Lithograph on Awagami Kitikata and Magnani Pescia
38 x 28cm

$750 NZD

Clouds drift across our skies with a quiet presence, evoking peace, joy, awe and sometimes unease. Though untouchable, they hold immense power: absorbing, reflecting and refracting light, they can obscure the sun and moon or amplify their intensity. In this work, cloud like formations become a meditation on the human psyche, drifting in isolation yet inevitably drawn back toward one another.

Alethea Richter

Filtered Light II, 2024
Woven multilayer silkscreen on cotton rag, custom framed
76cm x 43.6cm
$6,000 NZD

Filtered Light #2 forms part of a new body of work by Alethea Richter that investigates how the materiality of hand silk screen printing and hand-woven structures can respond to visual uncertainty in the post digital era. Through layered analogue processes, the work reflects on how images are filtered, interrupted and reassembled through material and touch. Filtered Light II was recognised as the winner of the 2025 Burnie Print Emerging Artist Prize.  

Sally Dan-Cuthbert Gallery

Widely regarded as one of Australia’s most significant and enduring contemporary artists, Marion Borgelt makes her highly anticipated New Zealand debut with new work from three of her most celebrated series: Lunar, Liquid Light, and Strobe. Borgelt’s multidisciplinary practice is distinguished by its sustained investigation into cosmology, optics, time, and the natural world; works that move fluidly across scale, form, and medium, engaging with the fundamental forces that shape our understanding of the universe. Her debut presentation at Aotearoa Art Fair marks an exceptional opportunity to encounter the full breadth and ambition of her evolving vision.

 Life cycles and nature are conceptualised in Borgelt’s intriguing, Liquid Light: Butterfly Series. The life cycle and flutter of butterfly wings is referenced through Borgelt’s expert, delicate use of Belgian linen where exquisite colours create an intriguing and mesmerising textile work.

Lisa Reihana is celebrated internationally as an artist, producer, and cultural interlocutor, she presents new images from Maramatanga and Nomads of the Sea, works that continue her groundbreaking inquiry into contemporary photographic and cinematic languages, and the complex intersections of identity, history, place, and community. A major figure in Pacific and indigenous art discourse, Reihana’s practice has earned her an outstanding international reputation. Her iconic film in Pursuit of Venus [infected] will screen at the fair, accompanied by images from the series. With all editions now sold, Artist Proof 1 is the sole remaining primary market opportunity from this landmark work.

Quills is a photograph from Lisa Reihana’s series Nomads of the Sea – a richly layered narrative that follows directly from her acclaimed Venice Biennale work in Pursuit of Venus [infected]. Nomads of the Sea weaves historical fact with fiction to explore the tensions between cultural leadership, spiritual custom and egotistical desire in the face of foreign political challenge in the 1800’s New Zealand, told through the eyes of two formidable female protagonists.

Milford Gallery

Paul Dibble: The Lost Garden (2023)

Combining the pathos of loss with the plural optimism of our unofficial national flower, the kōwhai, Paul Dibble’s The Lost Garden is a powerful narrative of loss as well as a celebration of being.  Lyrical and fluid, and quite simply beautiful, the extinct huia sits atop the metaphorical circle of life, looking back in judgement of who we think we are and our past behaviours.

Darryn George: Whakaari #1 (2025)

Darryn George seeks to honour and uphold the mana of people whose names are known and those whose quiet influence has shaped the artist’s life.  Whakaari draws inspiration from Barnett Newman – whose monumental fields of colour are punctuated by vertical lines intended to guide the viewer toward the metaphysical or spiritual.  Encompassing meanings of calm, comfort, and the restoration of peace across emotional, relational, and spiritual dimensions, Whakaari responds to Newman’s ambition by imbuing minimalist abstraction with a renewed sense of meaning and presence.

Jane Ussher: Scott’s Hut Cape Evans 4 (2008)

Long acknowledged as one of New Zealand’s foremost portrait and documentary photographers, Jane Ussher’s internationally acclaimed photographs of Robert Falcon Scott’s historic hut at Cape Evans honour the early Antarctic explorers.  Creatively manipulating light, Ussher reveals the minutiae of daily life, the rigours of scientific endeavour, and the profound isolation of Antarctica’s extreme environment, highlighting the human stories embedded within these pioneering journeys.

McLeavey Gallery

Bill Hammond

Untitled (Wainui work 1) and Untitled (Wainui work 2)

Soon after these two works were created, the late William McAloon reviewed a Hammond show at Peter McLeavey Gallery. He described this period as Hammond at “the height of his painterly powers”. Pinned to the wall beside these two panels was a postcard McLeavey wrote to Bill from Golden Bay, writing while surrounded by tūīs, bellbirds and Godwits. Entertained by their splendid dawn chorus.

Zhu Ohmu

Over the past year in Paris, Taiwanese /New Zealand artist Zhu Ohmu completed a three-month residency using the time to experiment with conceptual idea including her phone tile works, reflecting distance from home.

In gradually, then suddenly, the works explore intimacy, distance, and the traces we leave in our attempts to stay close. The hand-coiled ceramic vessels are based on the finger-smudged impressions left on phone screens.

The hues of blues that colour her were inspired by Rebecca Solnit’s A Field Guide to Getting Lost, where blue becomes the colour of longing- “the colour of where you are not.”

Nigerian artist Ruth Ige who is currently based in Auckland was recognized as the 2025 recipient of the prestigious Rydal Art Award for her work “And you stood in your power”  which showcased her unique style using second-hand plywood, oil sticks, dried leaves and acrylic paint.

Her figures are powerfully set within landscapes or colour fields of blue—impressionistic and speculative spaces that remain purposefully undefined. Her palette draws on the deep lineages of Nigerian indigo fabric traditions and the cultural significance of blue more generally for African communities, for whom it symbolises spirituality, protection, and love.

Artis Gallery

Neil Dawson

We will be presenting three feathers by Neil Dawson at the 2026 fair, a Kōtare and Kererū (both unique pieces) and a Huia feather which is an edition of 5, which is yet to arrive.

Feathers have long been a recurring motif in Neil Dawson’s practice, appearing in works installed globally—from Touchdown near Transmission Gully in Wellington to sites including the Art Gallery of NSW, Sam Neill’s Central Otago winery, and Shanghai’s skyline.

These new works continue that exploration, using the feather as both subject and point of departure. While visually immediate—light, colour, and a sense of effortless movement—they are underpinned by a strong focus on structure. Feathers are highly refined natural forms, engineered for flight and balance, and Dawson draws attention to this underlying complexity.

Precision-cut from aluminium and polycarbonate, the works heighten surface qualities—iridescence, scale, and finely detailed barbs that respond to light and space. Suspended, they appear to hover, reinforcing Dawson’s long-standing interest in weightlessness and spatial illusion. What initially reads as delicate and decorative reveals itself, on closer inspection, as carefully engineered and exacting.

Jordan Barnes

In this series, Jordan Barnes revisits the language of childhood—makeshift forts, draped fabrics, and improvised spaces—as sites of comfort, imagination, and retreat. These fleeting structures become quiet monuments to a time when the boundaries between reality and imagination were fluid.

Barnes approaches nostalgia as something reconstructed rather than fixed. Veiled forms suggest both presence and absence, while shifts between loose and tightly rendered passages draw the viewer inward.

Born in New Plymouth, Barnes is known for his psychologically charged figurative works. A multiple finalist in the Parkin Drawing Prize, he has exhibited widely and was awarded the inaugural NZAAT Artist Grant in 2010.

Josh Olley

The work depicts a man’s hand endeavouring to squeeze blood from stone — a metaphor for perseverance and tenacity. 

“As an artist, the challenge of raising my family through stone sculpture has, at times, felt impossible — yet I feel I have achieved this. This work is an encouragement to others to tackle the seemingly impossible.” – Josh Olley. 2025 

The hand is sculpted true to form, embodying strength, tenacity, and determination. The sculpture is carved from a single stone block, ensuring unity of material and form.

Foenander Gallery

Roger Mortimer  is one of New Zealand’s most significant living artists working in the ‘landscape’ genre. Mortimer has been aptly described as ‘a contemporary visual mythologist’ and is widely recognised for his distinctive use of medieval imagery, juxtaposed with early marine maps of Aotearoa.  His work gives a post-modern and post-colonial take on the charting of the local coast lines. Mortimer graduated from the Elam School of Fine Arts in 1999. In 2014 he was the Paramount Award Winner in the Wallace Art awards – one of New Zealand’s top art awards. In 2017, a survey exhibition of his work, ‘Dilemma Hill’, was shown in public galleries in Wellington and Auckland.  

In 2021 Mortimer had three works included in the landmark exhibition “Oceania Now: Contemporary Art from the Pacific” at Christie’s in Paris – a showcase which represented a unique opportunity for the French and international market to engage with some of the most important and established artists working in New Zealand today. The same year also saw the publishing of: Apocrypha: The Maps of Roger Mortimer  – a 160 page monograph with essays examining the last 12 years of Mortimer’s map paintings and weavings. Mortimer’s works feature in a range of significant public, corporate and private collections.

Vipoo Srivilasa

Vipoo Srivilasa, is a celebrated Thai-born ceramicist based in Melbourne

Vipoo Srivilasa, is a celebrated Thai-born ceramicist based in Melbourne and this is first time exhibiting in Aotearoa!

His playful and ornate ceramic works explore themes of migration, spirituality and human connection.
Vipoo’s new works for the fair are from his ongoing blossom series which incorporates flowers as a metaphor for friendship:
“Just as flowers brighten our surroundings and bring beauty to our lives, friendships blossom and grow, adding colour and vibrancy to our experiences. They remind us that, like a well-tended garden, friendships require care and attention, but the rewards are boundless.”
The character’s fingers form ‘V’ signs as ‘a universal gesture of peace, friendship and happiness,’ Srivilasa explains
“Despite the challenges we face, we can find solace and strength in our connections with others. By including this symbol, I want to convey that everything is okay, and that together, we can create a peaceful and joyful world.”

With career spanning more than 20 years, Vipoo Srivilasa has created intricate and elaborate artworks that reflect his bicultural experience living between Australia and Thailand. Working mostly in ceramic, he celebrates the intersections and overlaps between our cultural, social, philosophical, and environmental ideologies with a mix of humour and reverence, iconography and ornamentalism. His works often explore the dark parts of experience including isolation, loneliness, nostalgia, as well as joy, beauty, and hope in the midst of these struggles. Vipoo has exhibited extensively around the world, including Museum of Fine Arts, Boston; Saatchi Gallery, London; Ayala Museum, Philippines; Yingge Ceramics Museum, Taiwan; Nanjing Arts Institute, China and the National Gallery of Thailand. His work is held in national and international public collections across the globe including Henan Museum, China; Roopanakar Museum of Fine Arts, India; Craft Council, UK, and the National Gallery of Australia. In 2021, Vipoo was awarded the Ceramic Artist of the Year by the American Ceramic Society for his contribution to the global clay community – and is a nominee for the Legacy Award, at the 2026 Asian Pacific Art Awards -awarded to an individual or arts organisation, that has demonstrated leadership and a long-term commitment to intercultural and international practice.

Vipoo Srivilasa, 2026
Sacred Blossom
Ceramic, gold glaze, handmade porcelain flowers and mixed media 
390 x 180 x 120mm 
$9,500

Neal Palmer

Formally Neal Palmer’s large Kauri painting towers over the viewer and the gilded silver background gives the sensory impression of the dappled light shining through the branches.
The painting depicts Tāne Mahuta, and while this first impression of scale and perhaps the protection of its canopy are appropriate – the work also seeks to draw attention to Aotearoa’s complex ecology under stress.
With very few of these giant trees left after most of the forests were felled, the remaining Kauri are now threatened by Kauri Dieback Disease which has spread widely and kills quickly.

Dieback spreads through the soil infecting trees via their roots. There’s a lot going on under the surface that we need to understand before it’s too late.

A full-time artist since 1999, Neal Palmer has had 30 solo shows alongside participating in group shows and events at Artspace, Rotorua Museum, Hastings City Art Gallery, Artists in Eden and the Beijing and Los Angeles Biennial Art Invitationals. Palmer has been a finalist in the Molly Morpeth, Margaret Stoddart, Estuary Art & Ecology and the Wallace Art Awards and was an inaugural artist for the Karekare House residency and the most recent Artist in Residence at the Auckland Botanic Gardens (2022 – 2023_. 

Palmer’s painting practice revolves around exploring his natural environment and its visual language. “I have discovered subjects that can evoke strong emotional responses. I have been consistently interested in blending visual languages, and in exploring how the languages of colour, texture, pattern, and abstract forms can inform and cross-reference each other. One focus has been to develop work that uses the illusion of a photographic ‘depth of field’ to allow images to slip in and out of pictorialism and abstraction through shifting the viewer’s conscious reactions to colour, composition, and form.” 
 
Born in London, Palmer gained a Bachelor of Fine Art (hons) from Nottingham Trent University, where the work of his contemporaries Tim Noble and Sue Webster remain influential to this day. He moved to Aotearoa in the late 90’s, coming to terms with the natural environment of his new home, the artist engaged in painting again, to great success, finding a strong affinity and emotional nostalgic response from the native fauna. Allowing his work to slip in and out of pictorialism and abstract flatness; creating a tension between the paintings surface and the illusion of space. Aspiring for his work to be relational “on as many levels as possible” and passion for quality “mark-making that lifts the painting beyond the material world” is what drives this artist.

Anton Forde 

Anton Forde (Taranaki, Gaeltacht, Gaelic, English) began his carving journey at the age of 18, studying under renowned sculptors Paul Dibble, Gary Whiting, and Paul Hansen, before continuing his education with Professor Robert Jahnke at Massey University’s Māori Visual Arts Programme, Toioho ki Āpiti. Under Professor Jahnke’s guidance, Anton earned a Post Graduate Diploma in Māori Visual Arts with Distinction, followed by a Masters in Māori Visual Arts with First Class Honours.

Anton Forde’s carved timber pou stand watch like warriors awaiting in haka, this formation represents protection in standing together, and suggests a way forward in which one is guided by the ancestors of the past/

The artist, drawing upon his knowledge and connections, offers this position as one we might assume while navigating the increasingly uncertain times of climate change, from which we might conceive of ourselves as kaitiaki or guardians of the land rather than as its possessor.

His stately figures are at once a dominating and sheltering presence – in front of the,, we might take measure of our smallness in relation to the majesty of nature, of time, and of the many generations of people to have come before and who will come after.

 Forde’s artistic journey has taken him from Taranaki to Èire/Ireland, where he immersed himself in ancient art forms and themes. He now resides on Waiheke Island, a place that inspires much of his work. Over the past twelve years, Forde has exhibited both solo and in group exhibitions across Aotearoa/New Zealand, Èire/Ireland, and San Francisco, with a focus on sculpture and installation. His works are held in both public and private collections, locally and internationally. Central to Anton Forde’s practice is the exploration of our connection to the land, the majesty of nature, indigenous cultures, and the urgent effects of climate change. His works aim to inspire a deeper understanding and respect for our environment, with a focus on protecting the whenua (land) and moana (oceans) for future generations.

As Forde puts it: “With these works, my hope is to bring attention to the need for us to unify to protect Te Ao / our world. I hope these works connect us to our whenua and moana in a way that drives us to act, to protect them.”

Each of Forde’s pieces strives to make both an aesthetic and social statement, inviting viewers to reflect on their role in the ongoing dialogue around conservation and cultural preservation.

John Daly-Peoples

Helios

Auckland Arts Festival

Auckland Concert Chamber

Free Entry

March 8 – 15    10.00am – 9.30pm

Reviewed by John Daly-Peoples

This week you can experience Helios, a breathtaking, larger-than-life artwork created by renowned UK artist Luke Jerram.  Arriving in New Zealand for the first time, Helios is both a scientific wonder and a multi-sensory artwork, offering a rare opportunity to visualise the beauty and complexity of our closest star.

The globe measures six metres in diameter and was created at a scale of 1:230 million, it is constructed from approximately 400,000 images of the Sun’s surface. These images combine photography by astrophotographer Dr Stuart Green with data from NASA solar observations. Internally lit, this spherical installation allows for a safe yet awe-inspiring examination of the Sun’s extraordinarily detailed surface, revealing features such as sunspots, spicules, and filaments.
 

Named after the ancient Greek and Roman sun god – symbolic of time and life. Helios blends real solar imagery with animated lighting accompanied with an immersive surround-sound composition by Duncan Speakman and Sarah Anderson, creating a powerful and unforgettable experience.

Luke Jerram’s multidisciplinary arts practice involves the creation of sculptures, installations and live artworks. Living in the UK, but working internationally, Jerram creates art projects which excite and inspire people around the world.

One of his recent projects Echo Wood is a collaboration between the artist and charity Avon Needs Trees   It is an extensive new artwork made from 365 living trees.

The native trees will slowly grow into a vast 110-metre-wide design.  Blossoming at different times of year, pathways and avenues will be created to guide visitors on a journey through the forest towards a central circular gathering space, formed from 12 English oak trees. Echo Wood will take a century to fully emerge – but will endure for generations.

Co-commissioned by National Trust, Cork Midsummer Festival, Liverpool Cathedral, Old Royal Naval College and University College London.