Businesses back sculpture

An artist's impression of the sculpture on Pohe Island.

Local businesses are rallying behind an innovative sculpture to be built on Pohe Island.

The $500,000 Camera Obscura project aims to offer a new viewing dimension to Te Matau a Pohe bridge using pinhole photography, the oldest camera technology.

Culham Engineering has donated $46,000 worth of steel for the 8m corten steel exterior.

Other contributions include a donation of $4000 of concrete products for the project by Firth Whangarei and time/services donations by Rudolphs, McKays Electrical, GHK Piling / Bowling Infrastructure Group, Richardson and Stevens Engineers, Cook Costello, Geocivil, Formable, United Civil Construction, CCTV-Integrated Consulting and Uber Group.

Organisers have been given drone footage, design services, website and promotional postcards from Snapabove, Level, GFM and Printing.com to help promote the project.

Creative Northland and the Whangarei District Council have also chipped in.

A camera obscura is the optical device that led to photography and consists of a room or box with a hole in one side. Light from outside passes through the hole and strikes the walls inside, where the external scene is reproduced upside down.

The community-led project is driven by three self-employed business owners, photographer Diane Stoppard, architect Felicity Christian and sculptor Trish Clarke. It has the support of the district council and will be open during daylight hours for the public.

Ms Stoppard says the support from businesses has been spectacular but an immediate hurdle to cross is raising $25,000 to finalise the design engineering and 3D modelling for the build.

"We have had our first $1000 cash donation and will be having a legacy etching on the sculpture door to name all the business and families that support the project," she said.

The sculpture, recently named Timatatanga Hou, is expected to be completed by mid-2017.

- Email dianestoppard@gmail.com for more information about donating.