Bob Harvey: Bye-bye boofhead - the arts rule

Opinion

Aucklanders are surprising themselves that they are now the proud managers of the arts capital of New Zealand. On any Saturday, this paper is awash with the best and the brightest from the whole world. On any Sunday, we're fully engaged.

Outwardly, we have agreed for too long with the rest of the country that Aucklanders were sports boofheads who sank pints, squealed cars and watched Sky Sport. Secretly, we were nurturing the kind of ego our talent truly demands on the world stage.

Why would Waitakere City generate a hothouse of arts laureates like John Edgar and Anne Robinson, avant-garde dance like Lemi Ponifasio, or the Colin McCahon painting residency in Titirangi?

Because in time it has allowed the whole of Auckland to accept the growth of our collective creative ego. With it came the economic power of the imagination.

Who would have thought that rather than rely on the boom-bust cycle of major Hollywood film productions, Waitakere would hosts the greater part of the broader screen production industry in New Zealand. It hasn't made us all an Outrageous Fortune, but we've got a very tidy living, thanks.

To begin that industry, we really did start with the apple crates and work our way up. The original sheds in Henderson used to pack the apples and pears of the old Dalmatian orchards. Right now, we are well under way with the US top-rating show, The Way of the Seeker. The rate card for this "hotel for creatives" reflects how hard it is to get a booking.

There are so many of us now who can name a cousin or a school friend who has been an extra or a set designer on this vast network of businesses fuelled by good ratings. Check with your children - they know. Check out the screen industry in Sydney - Auckland out-competes them.

Each industry milestone has given Auckland more confidence in a consistent industry as a permanent feature of our economy, our society, our nature.

Twenty years of Shortland Street. Five seasons of Xena Warrior Princess and several of Hercules: The Legendary Journeys. The milestone of four major studios in Auckland, not just one. The milestone of real government funding. This has never happened before in New Zealand.

And creativity seems to energise everything here. The panelbeaters and cabinetmakers of yesteryear have now reapplied themselves to the enormous boatbuilding industry. This takes tradesman skills to artisan status, with up to 250 workers forming a single boat for up to two years over every handsome curve. This is under financial stress like many, but these boats need refits every few years, so the repeat business is enormous.

Often, the creative arts generate inspiration as well as recovery. The settled strength to Auckland's arts festival is the real corollary to the Government's Job Summit. The greatest, most efficient value production is the one where you make something from nothing and sell it. Simple creativity.

We should expect that in the next festival we will see Auckland's ethnic minorities make a more powerful showing. So as a member of the Aotea Centre Board I'm putting the challenge to Auckland's Herald readers: you can make a living and get famous doing this. For every small failure, there's a Whale Rider and a Sione's Wedding, and - wait for it - a Vintner's Luck.

I am, however, smart enough after decades in advertising, civic leadership, and the New Zealand Film Commission to know that there are road bumps. But that's where the arts do some things even better than politics.

They get to name the values we couldn't quite put our finger on and give us the language to pull ourselves out of this.

For nearly 20 years, Waitakere has grown an art and creative powerhouse. It's worked for our quarter of Auckland. It can work for New Zealand. It's time for a summit of the imagination, of creativity.

We have grown up, Auckland. We are the dominant market, and we like it. We have an ego to match that has matured.

* Bob Harvey is Mayor of Waitakere.