Great divide
The Manawatu¯ Gorge links two artists, 147 years apart.
This is the story of a Gully, a Hill, and a gorge. ‘‘And there’s been ups and downs ever since,’’ jokes Foxton artist Duncan Hill. Hill was at Palmerston North’s Taylor Jensen Fine Arts gallery two weeks ago to launch limitedrun prints of his painting of the Manawatu¯ Gorge – a work completed before slips eventually closed the highway.
The launch was an extra-special occasion – because of a personal and historical link stretching back 147 years. Hill’s great-greatgrandfather was English landscape artist John Gully, who emigrated to New Zealand and painted the gorge in 1870.
His image was of a lush, goldentinted vista, in an era when it was home to plentiful huia and flowering rata, and he worked from a particular vantage point overlooking the river.
The picture is featured in the book The Romantic Landscape, which summarises the life and work of Gully: artist, art teacher and draughtsman, and Julius von Haast: explorer and geologist.
Duncan Hill’s modern painting was done from the same viewpoint as his ancestor’s.
But at first it was hard to find. Writer-researcher Mike Stone, a longtime friend and gorge enthusiast, kicked off the project.
Hill recalls: ‘‘Mike was writing a book about the Gorge. He showed me an image, the chromolithograph from which I worked, and I said: ‘Oh, that’s my ancestor John Gully.’ Mike was pretty stunned, and the idea hatched from there that I go to the spot from where the painting was done.’’
‘‘So I went up there with my son Toby to try to find the spot ... it was kind of electric when I eventually found it. The painting was done before any closures were around. So it is prescient that the painting is going to print now, when the road may become part of folklore.’’
Te Apiti, ‘‘the narrow passageway’’, is full of mystique and legend. The Hill painting, in one respect, is starkly modern, in dense colours, showing the road curving away; strangely curling clouds at the top of the frame contrasting with green hills, deep shadows and a bright orange ‘‘men at work’’ sign.
But the historical and spiritual elements are represented too. Some of these elements, Hill muses, appear as ‘ghosts’ in the frame.
‘‘I have tried to sensitively cover some of the Maori aspects in the gorge’s history. Pakeha and Ma¯ ori shared this transport route; my ancestors would no doubt have been ferried by waka and the Cobb Coach Company [one of the ‘ghosts’ in the painting] also used the early gorge road and crossed at a point near Ashhurst.’’
Asked ‘how did you feel?’ during the work, Hill says: ‘‘I felt quite a bit surprised and uplifted by the gravity of the situation – a bit shivery up the spine, a bit of ihi [life-force power] and wehi [overwhelming awe].’’
According to his grandmother, says Hill, he’s the only one of John Gully’s descendants, until now, to
‘‘If it’s creative, I’m usually involved.’’ Duncan Hill
the Appalachian mountains.
Stone says: ‘‘The indigenous people of the area still catch eels there.’’
It was Taylor Jensen owner Stuart Schwartz who eventually brought all the threads of the Gorge painting project together.
‘‘I encouraged Mike Stone to pursue a dream he had to make available a painting by Duncan Hill based on the work of his greatgreat grandfather,’’ he says.
‘‘I like to support such ventures, particularly if there is a small benefit for our gallery ... we have no hesitancy in promotion of the gallery in this way as we are a commercial gallery with a heart solidly in support of community projects.’’ follow in Gully’s artistic footsteps.
Mike Stone’s planned book will cover, as well as the Gorge, the development of the 70-Mile Bush and related subjects. Several years ago he researched Mark Twain’s diary extracts about his visit to Palmerston North on a world speaking tour in 1895. During that visit, Twain rode through the Gorge, describing its foliage and calling it ‘‘romantic, with a little brook flowing in its bottom’’.
Stone says an amazing thing about the Manawatu¯ Gorge is that it’s one of only two ‘‘gap rivers’’ in the world. The other is in America – the Delaware Water Gap on the border of New Jersey and Pennsylvania, where the Delaware River cuts through two ridges of
There are still some prints available for sale.
Duncan Hill has lived in Foxton with his partner Alice since 2000.
His output is prolific. Though he’s painting less lately, he is also a woodcarver, sculptor, and beekeeper; illustrates books, is a cartoonist and poet, an illustrator for the Peace Aotearoa calendar, and a contributor to Organic New Zealand magazine.
As he puts it: ‘‘If it’s creative, I’m usually involved.’’
He’s even demonstrated street chalk artwork in recent years, including outside Te Papa and in Palmerston North. You can view that process on Youtube, and read his blog entries at Hilldoggvisionary.blogspot.co.nz
A piece of wisdom on the Taylor Jensen gallery wall reads:
‘‘When you buy something from an artist, you’re buying more than an object. You’re buying hundreds of hours of errors and experimentation and moments of pure joy... you’re not buying just one thing, you’re buying a piece of a heart, a piece of a soul. A small piece of someone’s life.’’
A thought that still rings as true in 2017 as it did in 1870.
●➤ Email: tinawhite29@gmail.com