Liz Caughey's favourite things

Liz Caughey has curated an affordable exhibition to raise money for her Braveheart Youth Trust.

Quality, affordable and collectable New Zealand art will be on display in Auckland this weekend, with a charity exhibition curated by Liz Caughey.

The Braveheart exhibition has been a year in the making for the art writer, collector and advocate, who has pulled together around 600 exciting pieces including sculpture and objects d'art from a range of established and emerging artists.

Proceeds from the exhibition will go towards Caughey's recently established Braveheart Youth Trust, a charitable trust that aims to reduce the number of young people entering courts and prisons. The ultimate goal of the exhibition is to raise funds to help re-establish The Right Track in the Central Auckland Youth Court.

Here, Caughey, who has been working in the local art scene for the past 22 years, talks to Viva about her favourite things.

10 FAVOURITE THINGS

1. Marian Fountain works
I am a great admirer of Marian's bronzes, and have several of her medallions and small sculptures, including this bas relief called Struggle with the Angel. Marian is a New Zealander now living in Paris. marianfountain.org.

2. Small Belleek miniature tureen
My mother gave this to me some years ago. It was inherited from her father - it's quite old, I think. It's marked Belleek Pottery which was established in 1857 in County Fermanagh, Ireland. It is made of delicate fine Parian china and feels incredibly fragile, yet has a funky look with its rounded body, tiny handles and three feet.

3. View from Tankatara Farm by Sarah Spratt
A lovely, restful etching which cost me the princely sum $243.56 at auction and is one of the artworks I enjoy looking at most in our home.

4. Icons from Greece
In Crete last October I stumbled across a wonderful gallery exhibiting religious icons by their most renowned icon artists. I spent a long time enjoying them all before buying this piece, a modern rendering of the first icon ever painted, by a highly regarded Cretan icon painter.

5. Bracelet
This bracelet was a gift from my daughter and is made from the leftover paper that comes from a hole punch. Knowing how much I admired those that Monique Jansen makes, she created one herself for my birthday last year - a true labour of love, and one of my most precious things.

6. First editions
A 1905 First Edition of Oscar Wilde's De Profundis, and a 1961 First Edition of A Grief Observed by N.W. Clerk (a nom de plume used by C.S. Lewis for the first publication of this book). These are treasured books that date from my period of collecting first editions in the late 1970s when I was working in London. I used to haunt the second-hand bookshops every lunchtime.

7. Humphrey Ikin Serving Table
We love this matai serving table, one of Humphrey's early works, which he describes as "a marriage of the Polynesian bowl and the European sideboard". It is so beautiful, we can't bear to put it to use.

8. Head of Christ by Richard McWhannell
Richard is another artist whose work I greatly admire. This is the second to smallest work of his that I have - it measures 170 x 110mm, and is framed in a contact printing frame.

9. St Andrew's Church, Epsom
We live close to St Andrew's Church, and I spend a bit of time there. It is a listed building, designed by the Reverend John Kinder. Built in 1867, it was enlarged in 1896, 1914 and 1926 - a wonderful example of an early New Zealand Gothic-style church.

10. Jeffrey Harris - Portrait of my Wife, 1971 (original price $40)
After restraining myself from bidding for this painting at an art auction I attended many years ago, I returned the following day to find it unsold and waiting for me still. Some paintings are just like that.

* Braveheart Exhibition, Friday May 28 - Sunday May 30, Pavilion 6, ASB Showgrounds, Greenlane, Auckland. Admission $10.