Notes and Comments

Turnbull Library Record, Volume 11, Issue 1, 1 May 1978, Page 42

Notes and Comments

Some further Ellis drawings It is regretted that, in noting other holdings of work by Ellis, no mention was made of the two watercolours and four pencil drawings held by the La Trobe Library, State Library of Victoria, Melbourne. These were presented by Walter Astley, resident in Australia, in 1913. They are recorded in the La Trobe Library Journal, v. 2, no. 5, April 1970, pp. 4,6, 7,9, with two illustrations —a pencil sketch, “A Woman of New Zealand” and a watercolour of the Fluted Cape, Van Diemen’s Land. There are pencil drawings of two Tongan chiefs, with a canoe drawn on the verso. All these are signed and dated 1777. Another unfinished watercolour is also attributed to Ellis.

Heaphy Exhibition For many New Zealanders Charles Heaphy, V.C., continues to be the New Zealand colonial artist. Yet this view is usually based on the relatively small number of his works that have been reproduced, particularly on the early lithographs of Wellington and Nelson. So that this artist’s varied talents could be seen in depth, the Library exhibited from September to November almost the entire collection of Heaphy’s paintings and drawings. The exhibition marked the launching of the 1977 Turnbull Library Prints, by Heaphy. This collection has its roots in the important purchase of New Zealand Company pictorial material in 1916 by Alexander Turnbull, which included fifty Heaphys. Over the years, by gift and purchase, it has been added to steadily and now numbers sixty-seven items, the major Heaphy collection in existence. An exhibition such as this shows the marked change in Heaphy’s style, particularly after the eighteen-fifties. The immediacy of his response, as a boy of nineteen in a new land, gave the early watercolours a strength and directness. Different paper and a different palette, together with the passing of the years and perhaps changing fashions, produced a more romantic style but one that still maintained the sharpness of accurate seeing. The change accompanied the progression from his painting as part of his employment by the Company to his painting as an accepted artist in Auckland. Although very different in character from the earlier watercolours, the works dating from this later period are also of great beauty. Heaphy’s view of the White Terraces, for example, shows us the

marvel on which so many early travellers commented, comparing them to classical baths where people relaxed and talked. Mention is made of the colours as Heaphy shows them instead of the rather lurid and somehow second-hand views of later artists.

Heaphy, in fact, was trained to observe: for much of his forty years in New Zealand he worked as a surveyor. Most of his life was spent in the open and the paintings and drawings in the exhibition were backed up by accounts of his doings, sometimes in his own lively style. Several early manuscript diaries which mention Heaphy were on view, including that of Captain Arthur Wakefield. Heaphy took part in the 1841 expedition commanded by Wakefield to choose a site for a new settlement in the South Island, eventually deciding on that of present day Nelson. Need for more grazing land for the Company’s immigrants resulted in Heaphy and Brunner in 1846 making one of the most arduous trips in New Zealand exploration, down the West Coast as far as the Arahura River and back, in twenty-two weeks. A graphic account of this journey, written by Heaphy and published in the Nelson Examiner, was accompanied by photographs of Heaphy’s drawings made on the way, which are now in the Sir George Grey albums in the British Library. The pair struggled up and down precipices, across raging rivers, often hungry and always coping with the almost constant rain. Heaphy’s interest in his surroundings was shown again in an article written for Chapman’s Magazine in 1862 which describes a meeting with Te Horeta Taniwha or Hooknose, the chief who as a small boy met Cook and who treasured for years the nail Cook had given him. This account was illustrated by a pencil sketch of the chief which is in the Turnbull collections: the British Library holds Heaphy’s later version of his original drawing. The meeting took place at Coromandel in 1852 where Heaphy was the first Goldfields Commissioner.

The early lithographs made for the New Zealand Company by Thomas Allom from Heaphy’s paintings of Thorndon, Te Aro and Nelson are among the best known examples of his work although of course they were redrawn by the lithographer who introduced several changes. It is seldom realized that other later editions were also published. What can only be described as a ‘forged’ edition was printed in about the eighteen nineties from plates freshly drawn by another, anonymous, lithographer although they purported to be the originals, and subsequent later editions were taken from this second printing. The variant versions are described in some detail in an earlier issue of the Record (v. 4, no. 2, 1971, pp. 74-94). The early prints were issued in both coloured and black and white versions; examples of both were displayed. The exhibition included a complete set of the successive lithographs derived from the Nelson

watercolour which was also shown. Examples of the editions produced in the eighteen-forties with those believed to date from the eighteen-nineties and the nineteen-thirties gave an opportunity to compare fine differences of printing and colouring. The exhibition was mounted by the Art Librarians, Mrs Sherrah Francis and Mrs Janet Paul, assisted by Miss Moira Long and Jeavons Baillie, the Conservation Officer. Several items, such as Heaphy’s rifle and his surveyor’s chain, were kindly lent by the National Museum. At the usual reception given by the Endowment Trust to launch the annual print series the guest speaker was the Hon. Alan Highet, Minister of the Arts and Internal Affairs. Mr Highet praised Heaphy’s talent and versatility, both as an artist and as a distinguished civil servant.

A Touring Cook Exhibition The past decade has seen a succession of commemorative Cook exhibitions in the various parts of the world which the great explorer visited. In 1969 the Library presented a Cook Bicentenary exhibition; in 1974 it acted as the Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ agent for New Zealand’s participation in the international Cook Exhibition in Portland, Oregon; in 1979 it will commemorate Cook’s death. But 1978 is the two hundred and fiftieth anniversary of Cook’s birth and another exhibition was prepared by Anthony Murray-Oliver and Jeavons Baillie for the Christmas holiday period. Although supported at the Library by showcase displays of original Cook manuscripts, contemporary drawings and early published volumes, the exhibition is primarily intended for subsequent tour throughout New Zealand over the next two years or so. It will be available upon request for display in any centre by local galleries, museums, libraries, schools or art societies and it has been designed for easy mounting and transport. Sixty exhibits, each measuring 20 by 16 inches, are chiefly enlarged photographs of paintings and drawings by Cook’s artists of the landscapes, natives, flora and fauna encountered on the three voyages, with portraits of some of the leading personalities. Some of the photographs are in colour and a number of coloured prints are also included. Groups of captions give details of each picture and provide a summarized biography of Cook and a running commentary upon the voyages from the departure of the Endeavour from Whitby until the death of Cook in Hawaii. Applications to borrow the exhibition should be made to the Library, Box 12-349, Wellington.

The 1977 Heaphy Prints The Endowment Trust’s first Turnbull Library Prints, known as

The Queen’s Prints published in 1963 to mark the opening of the new New Zealand House in London by H.M. the Queen, were of the watercolours of Thorndon, Te Aro and Nelson in 1841, by Charles Heaphy, V.C. Then followed the 1964 Heaphy Prints of Egmont, Hokianga and the Chathams. For 1977 three very different Heaphy watercolours were chosen, to show the relatively unappreciated range of this artist’s work. One is a delightful study of native parrots, believed to have been Heaphy’s first New Zealand painting, Kakariki from Ship Cove, and Te Awaiti, August 1839. The first paintings purchased by the Library after Alexander Turnbull’s death were three views on Rangitoto Island in Auckland Harbour, which were acquired in 1922, and one of these is the second print, showing a Maori fishing camp on the island, about 1850. When a selection of the New Zealand paintings in the Rex Nan Kivell Collection of the National Library of Australia w r as toured in New Zealand by the Library in 1953-54, a romantic view of Bream Head at Whangarei was greatly admired by many. After publication of the 1963 Prints Mr H. D. Gordon of Silverdale most generously presented two Heaphy watercolours to the Library. Great was the delight when one of these proved to be a variant version of the Bream Head painting and this has been reproduced now as the third print in the Heaphy set. As usual, a fourth colour print appears on the folder which accompanies the full set and this is a striking study of dense kauri trees, Cowdie Forest on the Wairoa River, Kaipara, painted in December 1839 when Heaphy was one of the party seen rowing Colonel William Wakefield up the river en route to the Bay of Islands. Two black and white illustrations are carried on the text sheet. Although sales have been exceptionally good, ample stocks remain. The 1977 Heaphy Prints sell at sl2 the set; single prints, including the folder alone, are $4 each.

The 1978 Earle Prints Augustus Earle (1793-1838) visited New Zealand from November 1827 to March 1828. It is appropriate that 150 years later his paintings should be chosen as the 1978 Turnbull Library Prints, particularly in view of the Library’s fortunate recent acquisition of an exceptionally fine watercolour. The Earle Prints will consist of the well-known oil, Meeting of the artist with the wounded chief Hongi at the Bay of Islands, November 1821 , together with the new watercolour, taken from the hills above the Bay between Paihia and Opua, View in the Bay of Islands looking toward the mouth of the Kawakawa River, fanuary 1828. Again there will be a colour print on the folder, the portrait of the young Maori chief Te Rangituke with his wife and son, which was purchased at Christie’s, London, by the Endowment

Trust in 1967. Earle had befriended Te Rangituke in Sydney before coming to New Zealand. It is expected that the Earle Prints will be released injune or July and it is particularly requested that no orders be placed before publication is announced. The edition will be of the usual 2,500 sets. A new revised catalogue of prints is in preparation.

‘ Record ’ Typography This issue incorporates a number of changes in the external appearance of the Record which were approved by the committee of the Friends in 1977. The decision to move from letterpress to offset printing to enable pictorial material to be more closely related to the text provided an opportunity to assess the overall design. The new form of the Record follows the recommendations of Mrs Janet Paul of the Library’s Art Room who was co-opted as a consultant by the editors. The main body of the text is set in Aldine Bembo 11 on 12pt with other appropriate sizes for headings, footnotes, the cover and title page. The paper is Mataura Superfine Offset lOOgsm 2 , the cover is Linweave Early American 801 b in Valley Forge Brick colour. Caslon flowers form the border on the cover while the ornament on the title page and cover is from a die commissioned by Alexander Turnbull for his bindings.