CENTENNIAL EXHIBITION

Waikato Times, Volume 127, Issue 21185, 7 August 1940, Page 3

CENTENNIAL EXHIBITION

CORONATION PICTURE SURVEY OF N.Z. ARTISTS One of the most outstanding features of the centennial year is the National Centennial Exhibition of New Zealand Art, at present on tour through the Dominion and now on view at the Bledisloe Hall. This collection, which has been arranged to show the development of art in New Zealand over 100 years, was the highlight of the centennial celebrations, in Wellington, of the cultural side of New Zealand life, and covers most thoroughly the entire period from the time of the discovery of New Zealand by Abel Tasman until the present day. In any young country there is always the temptation to place undue emphasis on material rather than on cultural values, and the opportunity of viewing this unique exhibition, which is a faithful reflection of the national spirit, revealing unmistakably the social and political changes, of the country, should not be missed by the people of Hamilton. One of the first engravings on record of New Zealand is by an unknown Dutch artist in 1642, but it is not until Parkinson, Hodges and Webber, the artists who accompanied Cook on his three voyages, published their sketches of Maori life that the people of Europe were able to form some impression of New Zealand. Of much higher artistic merit was the work of the Freii/ch artists who visited this country with the French explorers. Colonisation of New Zealand It was the colonisation of New Zealand by the New Zealand Company that provided the country with a small band of settlers, and sur-veyor-explorers, whose artistic powers were of a high order. Charles Heaphy, George Frencn Angas, John

Alexander Gilfillan, John Buchanan, John Gully, J. C. Richmond, Barraud, and Gottfried Lindauer are names which will live forever in the annals of New Zealand, as these men were to a great extent the pioneers of art in this country. In 1870 David Hutton arrived in Otago from England, and, under the direction of the Provincial Government, founded at Dunedin the first art school. With the arrival of James Nairn, the Scot, and Van der Velden, the Dutchman, the stagnation of the nineties ended, and these two men exercised a profound influence on a number of young painters of promise. The latter was an accomplished painter and draughtsman, and his decision to settle in Christchurch not only made that city the art centre of New Zealand but also did much to implant there that strong academic tradition in paintings which it has never lost.

In the early years of this century New Zealand possessed many young artists of great promise, some of whom like David Low, Frances Hodgkins, Heber Thompson, Eleanor Hughes and Owen Merton have journeyed abroad in search of wider opportunities. At the same time Goldie and Alfred Walsh were painting with great success. Work by all the above artists, including the Hamilton artist, Miss Ida Carey, and many more, are to be seen in this exhibition, which has as its piece de resistance the famous painting of the coronation.

The exhibition, which has been lent by art galleries, museums and private donors, is in charge of Mrs Murray Fuller, who visited Hamilton a while ago with the coronation robes.