Local musicians will be part of a unique brew of art and heritage when they tinker away on a $1.5 million grand piano at Whangarei Art Museum.
'Tinker' might be too slight a word for pianists tickling the ivories on the weighty, red carved and inlaid grand piano currently sitting centre stage at the museum.
Artist Michael Parekowhai once said: "There is no object I could make ... that could fill a room like sound can" - then he created He Korero Purakau mo te Awanui o Te Motu (story of a New Zealand river) from a Steinway.
The glorious fusion of object and sound is central to a tribute to New Zealand Aotearoa's heritage and two Maori artists whose work is on show at Whangarei Art Museum. The other artist in the Te Papa-curated exhibition, Black Rainbow, is the late Ralph Hotere, originally from and now buried at Mitimiti. Five of Hotere's "black paintings" form Black Rainbow.
In 2011, when Te Papa purchased Parekowhai's piano, the museum paid its top price ever for a work from a still-living artist - $1.5 million.