Rita Angus' painting Marjorie Marshall. Photo / Supplied
The top five big ticket items snapped up by New Zealand's national museum over the past five years have been revealed.
Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa has spent $3.174 million over 2019/20, and splashed out $2.496m in 2018/19.
Te Papa gets $3m every year through Vote: Art Culture and Heritage to acquire items for its collections.
After an Official Information Act request by the Herald, the five most expensive items purchased by the museum over the past five years have been revealed.
At the top of the list is an installation for the Toi Art threshold gallery by one of New Zealand's leading conceptual artists, Michael Parekowhai.
Portable Space (Working Title), which later became Detour, was acquired by Te Papa in 2018 for an undisclosed sum.
But the Herald can reveal that it was the biggest buy in the past half-decade – outstripping the $750,000 paid in 2015 for four works by Berlin-based contemporary Kiwi artist Simon Denny, which formed part of his acclaimed Secret Power exhibition at that year's Venice Biennale.
Third on the list is a rare historical painting by William Hodges, an English painter employed as a draughtsman on Captain James Cook's second voyage to the Pacific aboard the Resolution from 1772-75.
The top five list is:
1. Portable Space (Working Title) by Michael Parekowhai. Cost: Undisclosed.
2. Four works by contemporary New Zealand artist Simon Denny from his 2015 Venice Biennale exhibition, Secret Power. Cost: $750,000.
3. Waterfall in Dusky Bay with Maori canoe by William Hodges. Cost: $685,000.
4.The Aviatrix by Rita Angus. Cost: Undisclosed.
5. Marjorie Marshall by Rita Angus. Cost: Undisclosed.
Te Papa's head of art Charlotte Davy said acquiring new works is "vital".
"Te Papa acquires artworks for the national art collection that demonstrate artistic excellence, to inspire and challenge our audiences," Davy said.
"This is how we create a national collection that truly reflects the depth and variety of art in Aotearoa, across different time periods."
She added: "These important and powerful works have all been recently displayed in various exhibitions and have been enormously popular with visitors to Toi Art, the gallery where Te Papa displays works from the national collection."
At the height of the Covid-19 pandemic in May, Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern announced an $18m package to keep Te Papa - "a real treasure" - afloat. It was part of a broader package for the hard-hit arts sector crippled by the coronavirus crisis and was designed to substitute for the lost revenue of Te Papa's cafe, koha and events.
Te Papa's 68-day closure during alert level four lockdown was the longest in the museum's history.