Internationally renowned print artist June Wayne joins students at CAN for exhibitions

Hawke's Bay Photographic Society treasurer and events co-ordinator Mark Davey.

We have had a busy time at CAN thanks to the very popular Hawke’s Bay Photographic Society annual exhibition in our Main Gallery. Visitors have really enjoyed the challenge to select and vote for their favourite work from the high quality and wide variety of images on display.

Creative Arts Napier is proud to announce a major international exhibition of modern artist June Wayne. Wayne’s artistic career spans an unparalleled 70 years, her innovative lithographs, especially her constant experimentation working with the most important fine art printers in 1950s Paris and the United States, earned her a reputation as one of the world’s most prolific and sophisticated printmakers. This exhibition is the largest collection of Wayne’s works ever exhibited in the Southern Hemisphere and the most comprehensive display of her work worldwide in over a decade. This exhibition will run from May 13 to June 1, and will be one not to miss.

The Vision, a work by June Wayne.

In CAN’s workshop gallery we have Response, an exhibition of works created by the Level 3 Painters at Sacred Heart College Napier, until Friday, May 19. Students titled their works after the tropical storms and cyclones already through the South Pacific and the names of the ones to come. All works are for sale with the profit going to the financial aid needed in Hawke’s Bay at present.

“When Cyclone Gabrielle hit, school was closed for one and a half weeks. When we all returned, we all had vastly different emotional and physical responses to the event that had unfolded. As part of our processing of the cyclone, the students produced large abstract works to voice their responses,” says art teacher Sandra Howlett.

We have artist Ken Sando with his new solo exhibition, Bunch of Grunts, in the Creative Arts Napier Main Gallery until May 11. A practising artist for over 35 years, Ken has exhibited nationally in solo and collective shows, he holds a degree in visual art and design, and has held curatorial and project management roles in the arts sector throughout New Zealand.

“My art making is driven by an ongoing fascination with the construction and polemics of figurative and representational art and the perceptions of both the artist and viewer to the made image. Sardonically, I attempt to twist the perceived accepted forms of normative constructs by introducing, through my constructed imagery, fanciful paradoxical fabrications,” Ken says.

Friends and artists Andrea Lee and Susie King have come together to bring a collaborative exhibition, Canvas & Clay, to our Small Gallery, until May 11.

“I create figurative art in any medium available, and have exhibited my work several times in Hawke’s Bay. Colour, form and beauty in nature, especially the human body, inspire me. My influences are chiefly impressionists and the pre-Raphaelites,” Susie says.

“Having worked in all mediums, I particularly enjoy acrylics for their vibrant colours. I paint because I want to capture a play of light, a fleeting angle, some mystery of shadow, or a sense of isolation or escape. I paint what I believe to be beautiful and what I know I could live with and enjoy for a long time,” Andrea says.

There is always something new to see and discover at Creative Arts Napier.

Our new opening hours for the cooler months are Tuesday to Sunday, 10am to 4pm.