Talented Taupō artist Isabella is at it again

Isabella Thomas loves photography and bright colours and has combined both in a photographic exhibition titled My Hikoi and Friends. Photo / Laurilee McMichael

Ever since she was a little girl, Isabella Thomas has loved art.

And she is an artist of some talent as well. She creates beautiful tapestries and 10 years ago when she was living in Tūrangi, one of her paintings, Meme e Pepi, of a Māori Virgin Mary with moko kauae, holding baby Jesus, was a finalist in the IHC 2011 Art Awards and was later purchased at an exhibition.

Now living in Taupō, Isabella, 62, is still a member of Tūrangi ArtWorks and attends weekly. But in recent times she has also taken up photography and with the encouragement of her Tūwharetoa Health carer Tracy, she has covered the best part of two walls of her living room with photographs.

The images bring back happy memories of special trips and loved family members and sit alongside Isabella's beautiful pictures of colourful flowers.

Isabella is disabled but lives independently and as part of her endeavours to stay healthy, goes on walks around the district, taking photographs of things she finds interesting along the way.

It didn't take long before she had accumulated piles of images on her phone. With Tracy's encouragement she has had the photographs printed and has displayed them in an at-home exhibition called My Hikoi and Friends. Isabella estimates there's around a thousand of them on her wall, although a couple of hundred might be closer to the mark.

A selection of photographs from Isabella Thomas' at-home exhibition My Hikoi and Friends. Photo / Laurilee McMichael

Isabella is of Ngāti Tūwharetoa and Ngā Puhi descent and the last surviving sibling of eight in her whānau. That would be enough to make anybody prone to bouts of sadness but for Isabella, having pictures of them on her wall surrounded by beautiful colours is a lovely way to remember.

Tracy says on their walks together they often talk about Isabella's family and where they are now and it gives Isabella a chance to put the sadness and her memories of them into context and in her exhibition, her pictures of her relatives are surrounded by good memories.

On their hikoi, Isabella also particularly likes to look at and photograph flowers, not just for their colours but for the symbolism of being rooted in the earth which remind her of the branches of family and the connections between present life and the past.

She loves bright colours and her photographs, of blooms in yellows, oranges, pinks and reds reflect her sunny disposition and remind her of happy times behind and the spring colours that lie ahead. She has an artist's eye for colour, form and composition and her flower photographs are striking to look at.

Isabella with one of the two walls she has covered in photos for her My Hikoi and Friends exhibition. Photo / Supplied

"Bright colours make me feel happy and I feel 100 per cent better than I was," Isabella says.

"I like colour. I wanted to be a model or a designer because my mum was a designer and she could make clothes. She was a professional dressmaker, she was fancy and she had an eye for colour."

Isabella's favourite photo is a smiling selfie she took of herself wearing a bow in her hair, looking happy and relaxed. She says having her at-home exhibition makes her happy.

"I just look at them and think it's lovely looking at the flowers."

Tracy says displaying Isabella's photography, even though at this stage it is only as an in-home exhibition, is a way of showing what Isabella does and how talented she is.

"What struck me was that I have a brother-in-law who's a quite well-known art photographer in Sydney and New York and I look at his work and I look at Isabella's and I think 'why shouldn't her work be recognised?'."

Isabella Thomas in 2011 when one of her paintings was selected for the finals of the IHC 2011 Art Awards. The painting she is holding is a tribute to musicians Michael Jackson and Bob Marley.

Tracy believes an art group in Taupō for disabled people would be worthwhile as art can help people make sense of life.

Isabella too would like it if there were more arts in Taupō for people like her.

"I would like them to come here and we would get together and have fun."

Isabella wants to start painting again next year and is also learning te reo Māori at REAP. Her other great love is music. Tracy says when she arrives to see Isabella she is usually greeted by a blast of Bob Marley, Michael Jackson or Isabella's current favourite, Amy Winehouse, who Isabella intends to paint when she picks up a brush again next year.