Five new exhibitions open at Govett-Brewster Gallery and Len Lye Centre

The Govett-Brewster Art Gallery Len Lye Centre opens its winter exhibition suite with five new exhibitions.

The Govett-Brewster Art Gallery and Len Lye Centre opens its winter exhibition suite on Saturday, May 22 with five new exhibitions.

Stars start falling brings together existing and newly commissioned works by Teuane Tibbo, Ani O'Neill and Salome Tanuvasa, many seen here in public for the first time.

The artists' shared sensitivity toward the conditions under which, and locations where, art is made give a complex view of the shifting landscape of Pacific life in Aotearoa over the last half-century.

Also opening is There is no before, the first solo exhibition in New Zealand of work by indigenous Australian artist Dale Harding (Bidjara, Gungalu and Garingbal).

Combining contemporary art and cultural practices that extend over thousands of years, Harding presents an exhibition that adds to the canon of his family's cultural production.

The exhibition also includes 18 nulla nulla, a rarely-exhibited group of treasured works from the Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa collection, which have been selected by the artist as having a connection to his family.

"With this group of new exhibitions NPDC's Govett-Brewster Art Gallery / Len Lye Centre continues to support artists living in Aotearoa and further afield to create and share new work, and tell the stories of our place both in a national and international sense," says director Zara Stanhope.

"The winter programme extends the momentum and the many conversations generated by the momentous Tai Moana Tai Tangata by Brett Graham, and extends these to a Pacific and Australasian context, celebrating the gallery's 50-year history as a focal point for exhibiting contemporary art from around the Pacific."

The adjoining Len Lye Centre presents two new exhibitions by Len Lye, with a focus on his popular kinetic sculptures and sharing some of the stories behind the works.

Tangibles: 1963-1969 is the second chronological overview of Lye's kinetic sculpture. The exhibition presents some of Lye's most well-known and acclaimed tangibles, Universe and Storm King with lesser-seen examples such as the recently reconstructed Wand Dance and Albatross.

Also on exhibit is Wand Dance, one of Len Lye's most captivating large-scale projects.

The recently reconstructed work presents seven Bell Wands swaying, shaking and shimmying in a group composition – a thrilling example of Lye's work with sensuality and scale. Wand Dance performs every half an hour.

In the gallery's external Open Window Gallery, Paint over, use again - made by Wellington-based artist Raewyn Martyn in collaboration with film-maker Jess Charlton - is a site-responsive painting installation that uses biopolymer materials as alternatives to petrochemical paint products and will change over time.