Tim Melville Gallery

Tim Melville Gallery Contemporary New Zealand and Australian Art Auckland, NZ https://lnk.bio/timmelvillegallery/

More pics from Wellington … including spectacular artworks by Ngahina Hohaia Ngahina Hohaia and Darcy Nicholas in the ne...
31/08/2026

More pics from Wellington … including spectacular artworks by Ngahina Hohaia Ngahina Hohaia and Darcy Nicholas in the newly renovated + earthquake-strengthened Wellington Public Library (SLIDES 1-3),
performance art outside Peggy Robinson’s new(ish) gallery PEG PEG. (SLIDE 4),
Saffronn Te Ratana’s new exhibition ’Ngahere’ at PAGE Galleries (SLIDE 5) Page Galleries
Scott Eady’s ‘Philanthropist’s Stone’ and the much-loved Bucket Fountain both in Cuba St (SLIDES 6-7),
and Wellington Town Hall’s sparkling white spruce-up (SLIDE 8).

Alongside their new whakairo exhibition Te Papa had beauties on show including Kate Newby and Gretchen Albrecht on the same wall (SLIDES 9-10), Bill Hammond and Areez Katki just around the corner (SLIDES 11-13), Ruth Buchanan in the window (SLIDE 14), Shona Rapira-Davies’ ‘Nga morehu’ on rare display (SLIDES 15-18), and a spectacular Maureen Lander exhibition, ‘Aho Huna, Aho Whai / Threads of Connection’ (SLIDE 19) … separate Instagram post coming soon!

Even the hotel had great art! (SLIDE 20)
Yvonne Todd
The Intrepid

It was a privilege to be at Te Papa on Friday morning (early) for the opening of ‘He Toi Whakairo / The Art of Māori Car...
30/08/2026

It was a privilege to be at Te Papa on Friday morning (early) for the opening of ‘He Toi Whakairo / The Art of Māori Carving’.

An enormous crowd of artists, friends, whanau and dignitaries flowed up the staircase to the outside terrace at Te Papa.

The sun was rising as we were welcomed onto the marae ‘Te Hono ki Hawaiki’ and suddenly (for me) the contemporary carvings on the wharenui conceived by Cliff Whiting made complete sense (SLIDES 1-3)

As you enter Te Papa you pass the famous waharoa carved by Neke Kapua for the 1906 Christchurch Exhibition (SLIDES 4-5) and as you enter the Whakairo exhibition itself you encounter carved taonga with dates such as ’1450-1650’ - an attribution we’re not at all used to seeing in this country! (SLIDES 6-7)

I loved seeing the little carved Pouaka (1800-46) alongside the contemporary Waka huia treasure box (2018) carved by Rikirangi Manuel of Ngāti Porou (SLIDES 8-9)

But what I was most interested to see were the karetao (marionette puppets) carved and painted by Ngaroma Riley and displayed alongside Stevei Houkamau’s carved uku (clay) seeds.

The fact that female carvers were included in the exhibition at all is noteworthy! (SLIDES 10-13)

It was fascinating to see a 19th Century karetao from Pārāwai Thames (maker unknown) in the same exhibition (SLIDE 14)

Lovely catching up with old and new friends (SLIDES 15-17) and not at all surprising to see Ngaroma manage her TV interview for TVNZ Te Karere with such poise that she was given a new title (SLIDES 18-20)

Ngaroma Riley
Te Karere
Isaac Te Awa
Courtney Johnston
Stevei Houkāmau Artist
Te Papa

Thank you artsdiary.co.nz for visiting on the opening night of Nephi Tupaea’s “Assimilation” … it’s always a pleasure.Go...
26/08/2026

Thank you artsdiary.co.nz for visiting on the opening night of Nephi Tupaea’s “Assimilation” … it’s always a pleasure.

Go to artsdiary.co.nz for more pics

Until Saturday September 12
DM for a Catalogue
Website at Link in Bio

Thank you for coming to the opening of Nephi Tupaea’s ‘Assimilation’ exhibition yesterday evening … it was a full and fe...
20/08/2026

Thank you for coming to the opening of Nephi Tupaea’s ‘Assimilation’ exhibition yesterday evening … it was a full and festive house! 💥😍

Until Saturday September 12
DM for a Catalogue
Website at Link in Bio

NEPHI TUPAEA‘Tangihanga’2025acrylic on canvas1530mm H x 1215mm W
18/08/2026

NEPHI TUPAEA
‘Tangihanga’
2025
acrylic on canvas
1530mm H x 1215mm W

Please join us this Wednesday 19th for the opening of ‘Assimilation’ by NEPHI TUPAEA (Ngāti Koata, Ngāti Tiipa, Ngāti Ko...
16/08/2026

Please join us this Wednesday 19th for the opening of ‘Assimilation’ by NEPHI TUPAEA (Ngāti Koata, Ngāti Tiipa, Ngāti Koroki Kahukura, Ngati Kahungunu)

“In terms of the Māori experience”, Tupaea explains, “assimilation is another way of talking about occupation, but it’s also a story of resilience, survival and adaptation.”

“Our tūpuna were not passive participants in history but, rather, active navigators of immense social and cultural change.”

In the current issue of Art News Aotearoa writer and decolonial scholar Dina Jezdic discusses Tupaea’s interest in artists including Gauguin who “framed the Pacific as paradise, the exotic and as material.”

“[Tupaea’s] engagement with these artists is also an engagement with the curriculum itself, where European art functioned as the dominant visual language, and she uses appropriation to ask what decolonisation might look like within that inherited pictorial field.”

“I was introduced to Gauguin in the early 1980s at school”, Tupaea says. “He drew me in because he painted people who looked like me […] I’m not cancelling Gauguin, but nor am I excusing him. I simply acknowledge that his work exists.”

“What interests me is what happens when those images are reclaimed and the stories are told through a Māori lens.”

“Re-appropriation is the language I use to disrupt the colonial gallery; that’s where the conversation begins for me.”

Until September 12
DM for catalogue

Nephi Tupaea
ART NEWS
Dina Jezdic

‘Land / Mark’ Final 2 days 💥Nephi Tupaea next 🔥DM for catalogue
13/08/2026

‘Land / Mark’
Final 2 days 💥

Nephi Tupaea next 🔥
DM for catalogue

Amsterdam’s Stedelijk Museum was where Van Gogh had his first (posthumous) exhibition in 1905. It’s a 19th Century brick...
13/08/2026

Amsterdam’s Stedelijk Museum was where Van Gogh had his first (posthumous) exhibition in 1905.

It’s a 19th Century brick building with a grand staircase (SLIDE 18) and a recent steel and glass addition fondly known as ‘The Bathtub’ (SLIDES 19-20)

Last time I visited, more than a decade ago, I was delighted to see a huge canvas by Peter Robinson ‘Do you speak Dutch?’ hanging in the lobby (SLIDE 3) and this time I was delighted to see a vitrine of Warwick Freeman jewellery pieces (SLIDE 4) in a room labelled ‘Interwoven Histories’

“The artists in this room explore the ways in which memories and histories are transmitted […] their creators offer perspectives that have long been underrepresented […] Warwick Freeman explores the boundaries between culture, identity and meaning through jewelry, using materials that evoke memories and associations that are both local and universal.”

The museum has tons of works by Mondrian of course (SLIDE 5 and surprisingly SLIDE 6) as well as by the Russian Constructivist Malevich, whose work was seen as a dynamic variant of Mondrian’s geometric abstraction (SLIDE 7 top right)

An incredible work by Ghanaian sculptor El Anatsui - ‘In the World but don’t Know the World’ - made from thousands of flattened aluminium bottle cpas and copper wire stopped me in my tracks (SLIDES 1-2)

And it was wonderful to see a huge piece of Fijian masi cloth SLIDE 8) - albeit described as “date unknown, maker unknown, acquired in 1953 […] how and when this cloth from Fiji entered the market prior to that time is unknown. The Stedelijk Museum strives for full transparency regarding art of colonial origin and is conducting further research”.

If anyone is reading this … ?!

⬇️TEXT CONTINUES IN COMMENTS SECTION BELOW ⬇️

I’ve always wanted to visit the Mauritshuis in The Hague … it’s 25 minutes on the train from Amsterdam so I grabbed my c...
12/08/2026

I’ve always wanted to visit the Mauritshuis in The Hague … it’s 25 minutes on the train from Amsterdam so I grabbed my chance.

Mauritshuis

The house itself was built in the 18th Century for the Governor of Dutch Brazil - much of whose income came from the slave trade - and today it holds a spectacular collection of 17th Century Dutch ‘Golden Age’ paintings.

Vermeer’s 1665 ‘Girl with a Pearl Earring’ (SLIDES 3-4), Carel Fabritius’ 1654 ‘The Goldfinch’ (SLIDES 5-6 ... smaller than I thought … 100% recommend Donna Tartt’s book of the same name), Rembrandt’s 1632 ‘Anatomy Lesson of Dr Nicolaes Tulp’ (SLIDES 7-8, painted when he was 25 years old) and also (new to me) his 1661 ‘Two African Men’ (SLIDE 9)

Simon Luttichuys was new to me also (SLIDES 10-11) The label on his ’Still Life with Chinese Lidded Jar, Hazelnuts and Orange’ (1650) said the work was “acquired in 2019 by the State of the Netherlands via the Acceptance in Lieu Scheme”. Would be great if the NZ Government would accept important artworks in lieu of tax too … just imagine the quality of our public collections.

Loved Gerard Houckgeest’s 1651 ‘Ambulatory of the Niece Kerk in Delft, with the Tomb of William the Silent’ (SLIDE 12)

🙄 WORDS WON’T ALL FIT IN THE CAPTION … WILL FINISH TEXT IN COMMENTS SECTION ⬇️

Still in Antwerp …Onze-Lieve-Vrouwe / The Cathedral of Our Lady is the largest cathedral in Belgium. Construction starte...
11/08/2026

Still in Antwerp …

Onze-Lieve-Vrouwe / The Cathedral of Our Lady is the largest cathedral in Belgium. Construction started in 1352 and was completed in 1521.

Rubens lived and worked (and became famous) in Antwerp so was commissioned several times in the 1600s to make altarpieces for the Cathedral.

400 years later, they are still in their original positions.

I remember writing an essay about his 1614 ‘Descent from the Cross’ at University … the diagonal movement … the slash of blood-red in St John’s robe … the distraught figure of Mary in blue.

It’s wonderful being able to just wander in off the street and see artworks like this in the flesh … and in the places for which they were intended rather than in museums.

Address

4 Winchester Street, Newton
Auckland
1010

Opening Hours

Tuesday 10am - 6pm
Wednesday 10am - 6pm
Thursday 10am - 6pm
Friday 10am - 6pm
Saturday 10am - 3pm

Telephone

+6493781500

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