Category: Art
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This week’s Spotify playlist
Each week a playlist on the streaming app, Spotify, is curated to go alongside the blog articles. You can listen to the playlist on the player above. If you do not have a subscription you will only be able to hear a few seconds of each track. A free subscription will be interrupted with advertisements…
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A piupiu for Sydney
Piupiu are woven Māori garments that are worn either around the waist or over the shoulder. The Biennale of Sydney, an event that gathers together artists from across the world, commissioned the art piece from kairaranga (weavers) Hone Bailey, Paehoro Konui, Merānia Heke-Chase and Manu Fox who created it over three months, working on it…
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The artistry of Africa’s forest dwellers
The people who live in the equatorial forests of Central Africa have a unique sense of artistry in their textiles and music. These people, although once all defined as “Pygmy”, a pejorative term that is no longer used, have a strong connection to their forest home and make use of its resources to create, amongst…
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A concert in Hokitika
Last night’s Summer Soirée in Hokitika was an excellent experience. Held in the Renton Hardware Building, an old brick-built building that narrowly escaped demolition and is now being restored thanks to its owners and volunteers, the huge space lends itself to performance. It currently houses some of the artefacts from The Luminaries, along with tapa,…
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This week’s Spotify playlist
Each week a Spotify playlist is created to go with the blog articles and to respond to current events. For those with a paid subscription to Spotify you will hear the whole list without interruption, those with a free subscription will have adverts every so often, and everyone else will hear excerpts.
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A skull of lace
The Swedish textile artist, Esther Magnusson, has created a life-size skull out of lace. The skull was created from old bobbin lace made from cotton or linen and was stitched and glued together with cotton thread and wood glue. Wood glue was also used to starch the piece. The artist added teeth, crocheting them as…
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Fish Quay – Shetland
The Scottish Isles are well-known for fishing, having survived on and built their industry on the richness of the North Sea grounds for millennia. In the past, herring were a mainstay of the industry with women following the fish as they moved up and down the coast of Britain. These days the fishing industry is…
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Travels in the South
Over the festive season we travelled through the central part of Te Waipounamu/ the South Island of Aotearoa New Zealand. The journey of more than 1,500 kms, once all the side trips were taken into account, took ten days and covered some of the most spectacular scenery and sights of the island. One of the…
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Ohinetahi – gardens of enchantment
A recent trip to Christchurch/ Otautahi offered a surprising and lovely treat. Lyttelton is a port town across the hills from Otautahi Christchurch. It is at the entrance to Banks Peninsula – a definite must if you are visiting Aotearoa New Zealand – and there are many treats in store for those who venture there.…
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Suffrage in Stitches
Ashburton Art Gallery is currently hosting a Rather Wonderful exhibition about the emancipation of women in New Zealand. This show is made up of textile panels, each one dedicated to a particular woman who signed a 274 metre long petition to parliament, presented in 1893, demanding women’s suffrage in the country. The final works together…