"Rita and Douglas" at the Christchurch Arts Festival

Jennifer Ward-Lealand stars as painter Rita Angus in "Rita And Douglas"

The story of the relationship between painter Rita Angus and composer Douglas Lilburn presented the audience at the Rudolf Steiner School auditorium last night with the delight of seeing the superbly cast Jennifer Ward-Lealand working flawlessly with the effortlessly sophisticated pianist Michael Houston as they balanced beautifully a two handed piece of contemporary NZ theatre. What a treat to see these two on stage together. 

However the enjoyment of watching two extremely talented performers wring the most out of their material was  tempered by writer Dave Armstrong's sole reliance on Lilburn's meandering music to respond to Angus's paintings and her words written in letters to Lilburn.  This meant the audience were unable to gauge the true nature of the relationship at the core of "Rita and Douglas" - was the depth of feeling that Angus had for Lilburn being reciprocated, tolerated or rejected? Without knowing where the writer placed the artist-composer relationship on the continuum that stretches from Angus being the one night stand of twenty years before that kept coming back to haunt Lilburn or the long distance soul mate of an equally introspective and self-obsessed composer the play was difficult to enjoy.

What was easy to enjoy were the superb costumes designed by Nic Smellie that were made by Sheila Horton and Elizabeth Gibbons with the assistance of textile artist James Flynn from the Bowerman School of Design.  With Angus's unflinchingly honest self-portraits creating a vivid picture how we imagine the painter in our mind's eye (like Picasso in his Breton stripes) to see famous ensembles such as what Rita is wearing in her "Self Portrait Smoking" so faithfully recreated was an unexpected delight.

Thanks to the support of the Estate of Rita Angus we were treated to watching a large number of paintings projected behind the performers, at one point the projector wildly bounced around as a 4.0 earthquake rocked the auditorium but neither performer reacted to the 15 second shake in a display of pure professionalism.  The paintings of Rita Angus are always enjoyable to see but the occasional recycling of some landscape images was disconcerting as unless it was a portrait of Angus or Lilburn crucial to the unfolding tale of their relationship there didn't always seem to be a connection between the repeated paintings with the recitation by Ward-Lealand of a particular passage from one Angus's letters.

No-one who appreciates the contribution of Rita Angus to the visual arts of New Zealand or who admires the work of Douglas Lilburn is going to be disappointed by "Rita and Douglas" but perhaps writer Dave Armstrong's affinity and admiration for what he calls "two of this country's greatest artists" meant he created a piece of theatre that an ardent fan would enjoy rather than working the material into a play that despite the richness of subject and talent was just a little too earnest (and even with the enlivening earthquake) a little too soporific as well. 

Favourite part of the play for this reviewer? When Angus writes that there is no way that Lilburn will ever be allowed to buy "Cass" and other of her favourite paintings from her - and that perhaps there will be prints available one day that he could purchase instead!

Kiwiana art features at NY's new Kiwiana Restaurant

Chef Mark Simmons

The kitchen at NY's new Kiwiana restaurant

Recently New Zealand chef Mark Simmons chose kiwiana art specialists NZ Fine Prints to supply the artworks for New York's brand new Kiwiana Restaurant.

Prints chosen to decorate his new restaurant that showcases NZ's cuisine and culture had to be delivered to New York within a tight timeframe before Kiwiana's opening night in August 2011.

Born and raised on a sheep farm in New Zealand Simmons was amusingly described in a recent US interview as "the former Top Chef contender with the dreamy New Zealand accent".  After a stint at NY restaurant's Public and then a role as executive chef at Melt Simmons has decided to open the first kiwi restaurant in New York - "Kiwiana".

According to Simmons "Kiwiana is about combining the rich cultural and culinary traditions of New Zealand in a friendly and welcoming space". The cuisine at Kiwiana is inspired by native New Zealand ingredients such as the horopito pepper and our national dishes such as hokey-pokey ice cream. The food incorporates elements and techniques  Simmons acquired during his travels, starting in Australia, through Japan and on to the United States. Kiwiana features a variety of lamb and seafood dishes with a New Zealand twist - such as as manuka and marmite braised baby back ribs with squash purée , Milo-rubbed venison loin with potato cake, baby leeks and cola-braised cherries and raspberry lamington with whipped coconut cream and hokey pokey brittle.

Lamingtons (Image courtesy of Kiwiana)

So next time you are in New York and want to take your American friends out for a kiwi style feast of superb NZ cuisine check out Kiwiana - 847 Union St, Brooklyn, NY 11215, their website is http://www.kiwiana-nyc.com.

And for the record Simmons chose the following kiwiana prints from our kiwiana art collection - a large vintage style canvas by Paul Ny called "Kiwis can Fly", "Highway 80" by Grant McSherry and "Four Square Store at Sunrise" by Bill MacCormick.

What we know about an artwork's history changes our enjoyment of it

This morning we watched an insightful and entertaining look at why people like original paintings better than an identical forgery.  In this TED talk Paul Bloom argues that our beliefs about the history of an object change how experience it. And not just as an illusion but a deep measurable change in the way our brain feels pleasure viewing art.



How do we respond when the artworks may look the same but they have a different origin?  Pyschologists have argued that we care so much about origins because we are snobs, as Bloom says "we are focused on status".  So owning a handmade limited edition print is more prestigious than owning a reproduction of the same image because there are always going to be fewer original prints available to buy. Although Bloom doesn't doubt that this does play some role he believes humans are also to some extent "natural born essentialists".   He means we don't just respond to art in the way that we see it, our response is also conditioned on our beliefs about "what they really are, where they came from, what they are made of, what their hidden nature is".  You can own something that looks exactly the same as another artwork but it doesn't have the same history so your respond differently to it. 

Bloom quotes Christchurch philosopher of art Denis Dutton (whom we have featured in NZ Art Print News previously) who wrote "the value of an artwork is rooted in assumptions about the human performance underlying its creation".   Bloom's argument would be that owning an orginal print (which is the product of a creative act, knowledge of materials and technical skill) means the buyer will get a deeper pleasure from owning it than a poster of the same print.   If they were told that it was not an original print their pleasure in owning it would diminish (a case in point is Dick Frizzell's Mickey to Tiki lithograph which was reproduced with the edition number 5/50 on it, occasionally we have been contacted by people given this print as a gift whose pleasure in the gift is lessened when they are told that it is a reproduction although it looks identical to the original print).

It's an interesting question if choosing artworks with a meaningful history - even if they are "reproductions" - can have still give you a deeper pleasure. For instance if you collect only prints by quality artists or fine examples of the best paintings from New Zealand.  NZ Fine Prints try and stock only meaningful artwork, we have never understood the part of the market where custuomers are looking to buy art to "match the curtains".  I guess this touches on the prestige or snobbish element of art ownership alluded to by Bloom as a motivation of buying artwork for your home or office because your choice of art is a way of demonstrating to others your degree of artistic sophistication or level of art appreciation.  But for Prints.co.nz making a distinction between meaningful art and pure decoration is a way of helping us decide what we choose to stock at a "fine art" print specialist.

Prints by Greg Straight get NZ Fine Prints recommendation

NZ Printmaker Greg Straight

Pop Art Tiki by Greg Straight [Edition of 100]

Recently contemporary New Zealand printmaker Greg Straight (pictured left) was profiled by Kiaora magazine's Matt Philp (Straight's "Neon Tiki" graced the cover of the inflight magazine for Air New Zealand in June 2011). “Art and design used to be very clearly distinct but these days there’s far more of a crossover. I think my generation is more open to that. But fine art takes itself too seriously sometimes, which is why I like pop art. I love the idea of taking objects from everyday life and putting them in a gallery.”

Greg is at the forefront of the movement that is finally adding a contemporary urban sensibility into the visual arts in New Zealand.  “It’s a real challenge with kiwiana though, because everyone has had a stab at it,” he told Kiaora's Philp “You have to find ways to put a new twist on it and keep it contemporary. That might mean breaking the thing down into geometric shapes and using bold colours." 

Straight graduated from the University of Auckland's Elam School of Fine Arts majoring in print making.  A fine art printmaker who also works as a T-shirt graphic designer for streetwear brands such as Huffer and Federation Straight's artwork is an exciting melding of high art with NZ pop culture.

We are cataloguing Straight's first series of prints including "Pop Art Tiki" shown here and Greg Straight's prints wholeheartedly get NZ Fine Prints' "buy" recommendation for astute collectors building their hoard of contemporary NZ editions.

Notable new releases at NZ Prints

New releases have been piling up at New Zealand Fine Prints while behind the scenes we have been occupied with sorting and re-shelving the thousands of prints shifted from our Hereford St gallery following the Christchurch earthquakes.

Home by Weston Frizzell  1000 x 515mm [Edition of 80 Prints]

Among the new prints that have arrived have been a couple of superb new letter series prints called "Home" and "Whanau" from the studio of Mike Weston and Otis Frizzell  (for disambiguation of the various Frizzell monikers check out our previous article on who is Weston Frizzell?) and the complete Weston Frizzell seasons series (Spring, Summer, Autumn and Winter) are now in stock with some matching numbered sets still available. 

Mike has also just sent us some previously unseen editions from the Auckland Supercity styles series, the last two editions of the Behave series and his latest solo work "Float" that we'll get catalogued onto prints.co.nz mid August - with a backlog of over 140 prints waiting to be photographed and described we are running several weeks behind schedule for new artwork submissions.  Artists submitting new prints with the images ready, dimensions measured and a great description of the artwork written with the customer in mind may find they are bumped to the top of the queue!