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Art

Richard Taylor addressing the crowd at Vision for Wellington’s second event. Image: Joel MacManus
Opinion

Windbag: Vision for Wellington shows its blind spots

The political supergroup's event about Wellington's art scene involved lots of CEOs and very few artists.
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By Joel MacManus | 15th April, 2025
Wellington editor
Portraits by Abhi Chinniah. (Photo: Supplied)

‘We just are’: When can migrant artists stop representing culture and just create art?

Representation matters, but the piece of the puzzle that’s missing is the freedom to represent no one but yourself.
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By Preyanka Gothanayagi | 2nd December, 2024
Contributor
Berst finds a place for graffiti in the metaverse (Image: supplied, Additional design: Archi Banal)

Can VR graffiti make the metaverse cool?

Graffiti is an art form traditionally anchored in physical, urban space – but does it have to be?
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By Shanti Mathias | 23rd June, 2022
Contributing writer
POV: You are lost at the Venice Art Biennale (Photo: Sharon Lam; Design: Archi Banal)

Lost at the Venice Art Biennale

Sharon Lam goes in search of Yuki Kihara’s Paradise Camp, the New Zealand pavilion at the 2022 Venice Biennale.
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By Sharon Lam | 6th June, 2022
Contributing writer
 Yona Lee: An Arrangement For 5 Rooms, 2022, Auckland Art Gallery

Steel the show: How Yona Lee’s new exhibition is breaking boundaries

This Auckland artist plays with space in her latest exhibition, which uses steel tubing in ways you've never seen it before.
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By Naomii Seah | 15th May, 2022
Contributing writer
Don’t miss Auckland Art Gallery’s breathtaking Pacific feminist exhibition

Don’t miss Auckland Art Gallery’s breathtaking Pacific feminist exhibition

It features work from 12 artists – including one stunning piece being performed live one time only.
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By Tulia Thompson | 6th May, 2022
Guest writer
Raroboys are rewriting the narrative in the art scene in Tāmaki Makaurau. (Image: Tina Tiller)

Raroboys are putting young Pasifika artists on the map

Arizona Leger meets some of the creatives taking part in the collective's first major exhibition, Raroboys and Friends.
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By Arizona Leger | 25th March, 2022
Contributing writer
Pasifika artist Ioane Ioane behind the moa replica at the 2022 Sculpture on the Gulf. (Image: Archi Banal)

Spotted: Giant moa on Waiheke Island

The treetop-nudging sculpture is part of this year's Sculpture on the Gulf, which makes its welcome return to Waiheke for 2022.
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By Sela Jane Hopgood | 5th March, 2022
Pacific communities editor
‘Wheke Fortress is more than an arts initiative,’ says Tokerau Brown (left). (Image: Archi Banal)

It takes a village to build a fortress

A new Onehunga art space for Māori, Pasifika and marginalised communities in central Auckland aims to be more than just an art initiative.
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By Arizona Leger | 4th March, 2022
Contributing writer
Liam Brown, Kahu Kutia, Hāmiora Bailey and Fern Ngatai. (Photos: Supplied; additional design: Archi Banal)

Takatāpui artists on what it means to be Māori and queer

'To look at ourselves as disparate things, we’re then weakening ourselves because we’re not ever broken. We are whole.'
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By Reweti Kohere | 3rd March, 2022
Staff writer
Inflatable mokomoko and wheke at the Kura Moana installation. (Images: Mark Tantrum with additional design by Tina Tiller)

In Wellington, Lisa Reihana’s public art tells stories of the moana that connect us all

And you might just spot a giant octopus or lizard along the way.
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By Charlotte Muru-Lanning | 2nd March, 2022
Contributing writer
(Image: Archi Banal)

Auckland artist Hazel Zishun is redefining makeup

Forget soap brows and Euphoria looks, this makeup artist is pushing the definition of makeup itself.
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By Naomii Seah | 28th February, 2022
Contributing writer
Surrealist Art | He Toi Pohewa gallery view. Photo by Maarten Holl, 2021 | Te Papa

Dark dreams and subconscious desires: Surrealist Art at Te Papa, reviewed

Megan Dunn and her six year old daughter spend an afternoon with the surrealists at Te Papa's blockbuster exhibition.
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By Megan Dunn | 20th July, 2021
Guest writer
Judy Darragh ONZM and Richard Orjis in conversation about Arts Makers Aotearoa. (Image: Tina Tiller)

Art makers unite: The advocacy group where artists’ voices matter most

Founded in 2020, Art Makers Aotearoa is a community of makers jointly advocating for the arts.
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By Kerryanne Nelson | 4th July, 2021
Guest writer
Ants paintings by AI artist Dribnet (Tom White) (Photo: Ben Newman)

Ant art: The exhibition of paintings created entirely by artificial intelligence

No human made the art hanging on the walls of this Wellington art gallery – it's the creation of the 'mind' of an algorithm.
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By Mirjam Guesgen | 15th March, 2021
Contributing writer
Getty Images
Opinion

False flag: The Mercy Pictures furore and the dangerous power of art

Art writer and former gallerist Sarah Hopkinson attempts to understand the contradictory values that produced the People of Colour exhibition, and what the tumult means for the future of the industry.
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By Sarah Hopkinson | 2nd December, 2020
Guest writer
(Photos: Supplied)

50 years ago we had some extremely peculiar notions about plants

Zina Swanson's paintings are inspired by old, outlandish books about botany.
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By Chloe Lane | 22nd November, 2020
Guest writer
Works in the Mercy Pictures show ‘People of Colour’. (Photos: Tash van Schaardenburg)
Opinion

Swastikas off K Road: How the worst art show in New Zealand came to be

The controversy over the People of Colour exhibition shows how alt-right ideas can thrive in irony-steeped artistic environments.
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By Amal Samaha | 12th November, 2020
Guest writer
Hindwings of a peacock swallowtail butterfly, Papilio blumei, collected from the Bantimurung area of Suluwesi. The magnificent blue-green colouring is the result of light interacting with nano-scale structures on the wings rather than pigments (Photo: Jane Ussher)

Stupendously beautiful new photographs by Jane Ussher

Te Papa's natural history collection, photographed by a living legend.
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By Jane Ussher | 14th October, 2020
Guest writer
Bryce Street, by Bob Kerr (© Bob Kerr 2020)

The Intersection: The story of a massacre

At a nondescript rural intersection in Waikato lies the site of a near-forgotten massacre, the subject of a new show by artist and writer Bob Kerr, who tells the story of Rangiaowhia here.
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By Bob Kerr | 12th October, 2020
Guest writer

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