Media/Texts > Essays

Illustrated catalogue to accompany the exhibition - Essay 'New Zealand Colourists' by Jonathan Mane-Wheoki.
Featured image / Catalogue cover
Matthew Browne, 'Sequester V11' - 2000.

Touring Exhibition

Pataka Museum of Arts & Cultures
Hawkes Bay Exhibition Centre
Waikato Museum of Art & History
Manawatu Art Gallery
Rotorua Museum

Artists

Gretchen Albrecht, Philippa Blair, Jeff Brown, Matthew Browne
Philip Clairmonte, Max Gimblett, Rudolph Gopas, Jeffrey Harris
Emily Karaka, Len Lye, Rob McLeod, Milan Mrkusich, John Reynolds
Philip Trusttum


Draftsmen may be made, but colourists are born. Eugene Delacroix

Colours are forces, radiant energies that affect us positively or we are aware of them or not. Think Colour - art is never just black and white presents an opportunity to consider how the use of colour in contemporary New Zealand painting reflects our identity and affects us all.

This exhibition celebrates the work of leading New Zealand colourists.Though each of the artists in the exhibition approaches the activity of painting differently, all of them use colour as an expressive tool to explore its emotional power. The participating artists have an innate and intuitive feeling for colour and engage the viewer in an intense relationship through its use.

The twentieth century has often been called the period when colour finally came into its own. There has been a progressive lightening of the palette and an exploration of colour as an expressive tool.

Yet in the post-modernist landscape of New Zealand painting, the restricted palette has become mainstream. Artists who do persist in using colour are often undervalued. The colours enjoyed by a nation often reveal something about the people. There is something so persuasive about the use of black in New Zealand that it must surely reflect an aspect of national identity.

This exhibition, in celebrating leading New Zealand colourists. begs the question: what lies behind New Zealand's passion for black? Why do artists eschew strong and vibrant colour in favour of a restrained palette? Why has black become such a significant colour in New Zealand painting? Can it be that our passion for black, which is so intimately associated with our national identity, is reflective of a lingering puritanism, an emotional reticence in our national psyche?

The exhibition seeks to foster a more inclusive environment for New Zealand painting, allowing for greater celebration of colour in New Zealand art.

Colour is life: for a world without colours appears to us as dead. Johannes Itten


Helen Kedgley

Curator of Contemporary Art
Pataka Porirua Museum of Arts and Cultures