Vault/2014
Rococo Revolution
12 November 2014 - 20 December 2014
A recent whirlwind tour of museums, palaces and treasure houses in Europe was both exciting and nauseating in equal measures.
Read More
Bootcamp
07 August 2014 - 26 September 2014
It was a visit in 2012 to Street, a small Somerset (UK) village with a big Shoe Museum that ‘tipped the scales’ for John Perry. Upon returning to New Zealand he started to consolidate shoe, and shoe-related, material collected on an ad hoc basis over the past 40 years.
Put a Cover on It
17 March 2014 - 26 April 2014
Thirty four years ago I was given a very fine crocheted and beaded jug cover as a wedding present by Mrs Laubscher, a distant relative. It was put away somewhere safe and forgotten.
Three years ago I was visiting my mother and at the back of a kitchen drawer I found a stained old jug cover, sadly neglected. I asked about it and was told that Mrs Laubscher had made it and given it to my mother many years ago. I rescued it and brought it back to Auckland.
Muslin from Mosul
01 February 2014 - 08 March 2014
Growing up
in Iraq collector Enaam Battani recalls that she had an ‘incomprehensible
passion’ for old things. She recalls a childhood visit to the remnants of the
city of Babylon where she tried to souvenir fragments and her father forbidding
her to remove these fragments. This experience kindled her interest in Iraqi
antiquities and culture. This passion has travelled with her and is expressed
in a number of ways in her life in New Zealand. As a jeweller she works with
silver and Bedouin jewellery elements, often reshaping and redesigning broken
elements, to create new works that convey the richness of the cultures of Iraq.