Notable for approach to colour, high level of expertise
Artist
ARTIST and graphic designer Zuna Wright, who died on Christmas Eve 2017 aged 78, disregarded her long illness and continued to paint and exhibit for as long as possible.
‘‘Painting is what I do. Other people express things in words; I paint. I have always painted. My commercial work has been done around my painting,’’ she said.
She was known to many in Dunedin as a graphic designer, the artist behind the attractive greeting cards sold locally and nationwide. Her work has been notable for a distinctive approach to colour and a high level of expertise.
But she will also be remembered as a former member of the Otago Art Society and exhibitor of paintings, most recently at the Inge Doesburg Gallery in 2017.
Born in South Africa, she studied at the Johannesburg School of Art in the 1950s, where she found the firstyear syllabus very handson, based on the Royal Academy’s, with 14 subjects, including a paper on perspective and work on anatomy with models and a textbook. There were four hours of drawing every day, from casts and models.
In the second year, students could choose one of two streams — commercial or teaching art. Zuna chose commercial art, as she needed to support herself.
Graduating with honours in 1959, she spent the next 10 years working in advertising for some very large companies and travelling widely. She also spent a year teaching design at her old school.
She migrated to New Zealand with her husband and two sons in 1977.
She continued to work as a graphic designer and to paint. This was when she joined the Otago Art Society, attending some classes.
Always an outdoors person, Zuna enjoyed gardening, tennis, diving and climbing. A lot of the memories in her paintings come from those experiences — Mt Cook, shearers’ quarters, big skies.
But the things that spoke to her heart were also from childhood and growing up, so flashes of South Africa and her travels are there too.
She described her work as deconstructive, manipulating proportions and perspective to provide depth. Her works in gouache amply demonstrate her skills.
In an interview in 2016, she said: ‘‘I work on two paintings at a time. That way they don’t get stuck. They keep moving.
‘‘Memories start coming when I am painting. It is not often that I know what is going to come out at the beginning of a session. My work is about anything and everything. I can paint for two hours but it feels like five minutes.
‘‘People ask me where my paintings come from. I say they have 75 years of expertise in them. You have to have a good toolbox of skills before you can do more. Endless drawing and endless painting, then you can free yourself.’’
She added: ‘‘People ask me what art is. Craft is what you learn, the technical knowledge. Art is what you do with it.’’
— Inge Doesburg, Wendy Harrex
and Marjorie and Marc Hay