Kia Māia, Be Brave

Over the last couple of years, I have been focussing on painting the local hills around the northern suburbs of Wellington, New Zealand. Living in Johnsonville, we have easy access to some great tracks including Old Coach Road.

On one of these tracks there are many steps right from the get-go, and half way up you can stop and enter an old tunnel, which was built to house outlet pipes from the old Onslow County Borough water reservoir. It dates back to around 1910.

I was exploring the tunnel one day with our daughter, and when we were about half way in, I shone my phone light up at the ceiling. We were met by hundreds of cave wētā, which is a type of nocturnal spider cricket. It was a bit like an Indiana Jones movie (showing my age there!), and our daughter stood and looked at these awesome creatures before making a sharp exit towards the light.

While I was busy getting some reference images of the entrance from with the tunnel, our daughter turned around and struck a pose, demonstrating her new found bravery. I knew I had to recreate the moment with a painting, and it took me a few years to get around to it (or at least to learn how to pull it off). Using some acrylic gel medium before laying down the oil paint allowed me to experiment with rich textures, which was a new direction for me. This texture added a more three dimensional feel to the sides of the tunnel.

Once I was half way through, I received an email from the New Zealand Academy of Fine Arts (NZAFA) with a call for entries to the Visual Arts Prize. This was to be a new event in lieu of the Parkin Prize for Drawing, which had been unable to be held this year due to lack of venue. Fortunately, as I was already in the process of painting it, I was able to complete it with enough time to allow it to dry and apply a layer of garmin varnish to it prior to framing and entered it into the competition.

Once I had heard that my work had been accepted, i could breathe a sigh of relief. In the meantime I needed to get to the UK with short notice, so I packaged the painting carefully and left it in the safe hands of Pack & Send New Zealand, who were really helpful.

I'm pleased to say that although I was not able to make it to the exhibition, my wife and daughter were there to represent me on the opening night. There was a blue sticker next to the artwork, which meant I was a finalist. If you voted for my artwork in the people's choice, I would like to say thank you - it's much appreciated. There were over 400 entries, with 90 finalists.

The winning piece by Yavanna den Harder “Eye For Detail” was incredible, as were the merit award winners, so congratulations to those artists.

Thank you to the NZAFA for hosting such a great event at the Tākina Wellington Convention and Exhibition Centre.