Evironment centre stage at Patea exhibitions

Patea's Cameron Curd of Aotea Utanganui, Museum of South Taranaki, reads visitor comments left on sticky notes surrounding paintings by the late Derek Parker Little.

Two new exhibitions that share an environmental theme have been installed at Aotea Utanganui, Museum of South Taranaki, in Patea.

No End in Sight opened three weeks ago and is billed as a retrospective of the works of Eltham artist, the late Derek Parker Little.

Mr Little's art works are large-scale political and environmental statements about the impacts of exponential population growth, industrialisation, pollution, and the consumption of non-renewable resources.

Museum curator Cameron Curd said Mr Little often said there was no point to his work unless people engaged with the issues they raised. With that in mind the exhibition includes an ability for the audience to leave comments by way of sticky notes on the walls next to where the paintings hang.

"The notes will become a permanent part of the collection and will be returned to the family along with the paintings," Mr Curd said.

The paintings contained stories on big global issues and include several un-finished paintings which Mr Little was working on before his death in July 2014, aged in his late eighties.

"My biggest hope is my work will get into the curriculum at schools to show today's generation we can't go on doing what we are doing," Mr Little is quoted in exhibition literature. "We go in complete circles all the time. The destruction of wildlife, forests, it's all for money. We've lost our sense of value. My biggest concern is there won't be a world".

One painting depicts notable wars with dates on crosses but unnervingly includes several blank crosses - presumably to warn about the possibility of future conflicts.
The exhibition runs through to April.

Opening this week is another environmental but perhaps less political exhibit - Go Deep Beneath the Ocean to Discover Uncharted Territory.

The exhibition showcases the work of the South Taranaki Reef Life Project and is a discovery and documentary of the subtidal rocky reef communities found in the South Taranaki Bight.

Mr Curd said inspiration for the exhibition came from National Geographic and what was happening to the environment throughout the world.

The exhibition includes photographs and moving images from a target reef 11km offshore and 23km deep.

A number of visits were made during the year to document the ecological variance across seasons. A range of basic scientific methods were used to survey the reef. Additional reefs are to be surveyed in the future.

Partners in the project include South Taranaki Underwater Club, Haera High School, Te Kaahui o Rauru and Patea Area School.

The exhibition opens this week and runs through to April.