No Straight Lines, Te Whare Toi o Heretaunga Hastings City Art Gallery 2023

Opening just two months after the devastating floods of Cyclone Gabrielle, this exhibition offered a bright, uplifting environment for the community to refresh themselves in. No Straight Lines (given the te reo name pekapeka by Charlie Ropitini, Ngati Kahungunu) featured mostly large works from 2017 to 2023, with the centrepiece 28th April 2023 stretching nearly 11m long and 3m high. This allowed viewers to immerse their field of vision in the paintings, as well as making the most of the spacious chapel-like gallery.

FEATURED EXHIBITION ARTWORKS

Title: 28th August 2023

It often takes a while to find myself again after a major show. This was the first painting I was happy with following No Straight Lines 4 months prior.

Title: 28th April 2023

Although begun in late 2022, the greater realisation of this work took place after the devastating floods of Anniversary Weekend in Tamaki Makaurau Auckland and Cyclone Gabrielle in Matau-a-Maui Hawkes Bay.

Title: 24th July 2022

My signature is always on the back of the work, yet here the red ribbon careering across nearly 3m of canvas loosely spells my initials EW. Sometimes you have to shout from the top!

Title: 6th February 2022

This unusual colour palette was influenced by Wassily Kandinsky’s Three Elements (1925) and used in two works for my Lollygagger exhibition at PAULNACHE.

NEWS

Largest work to date 28th April 2023

My exhibition No Straight Lines at Te Where Toi o Heretaunga Hastings City Art Gallery provided the opportunity to negotiate with its Main Gallery, the largest un-poled space in the Southern Hemisphere.

Creative Matters Podcast

Whether you’re out for a stroll or need some aural distraction while working, you can now listen to me in conversation with Mandy Jakich at her lovely Muriwai studio for Creative Matters.

Exquisite Colours collaboration with Schmincke

My collaboration with renown German paint manufacturer Schmincke in 2022, designing the palette of colours for a Ultimate Mixing Set of Horadam Watercolours, was so successful that they asked me to devise a new set for 2023.

Newsletter February 2022

Delightfully, I’ve realised this newsletter reflects a part of my practice where elements come together to make a whole.