Chance find sparks display
A Palmerston North secondhand dealer’s chance discovery of two works from mysterious 19th century watercolourist Christopher Aubrey has enabled New Plymouth’s museum to finally put on awhole exhibition of his art.
The exhibition, titled 1896: Christopher Aubrey’s Taranaki, opened at Puke Ariki’s Lane Gallery on Friday to the delight of the museum’s pictorial curator Chanelle Carrick. ‘‘It’s really nice to celebrate his visit here and put him in a Taranaki context.’’
Aubrey was an itinerant travelling artist who was active in New Zealand from the 1870s to 1900s, although there is no record of his birth, how he got to the country, or record of his death.
‘‘He’s a bit of amystery,’’ Carrick said. ‘‘But you can trace his travel through New Zealand and how he was making a living through selling these paintings through newspapers.’’
He travelled through Dunedin, Oamaru, Timaru, Wellington, and Wairarapa before arriving in Taranaki in 1896. ‘‘And we know this becausewe have these paintings.’’
Puke Ariki had seven of the paintings in its collection and had only shown them as one-off pieces. But after lockdown the museum was contacted by the secondhand dealer who had uncovered two more paintings when going through someone’s estate. Theywere verified original and were donated to the museum’s collection. It is the first time the works have been showcased all together, Carrick said.
‘‘It was really, really incredible. For a business to offer us these paintings was really cool and really generous. Then that brought our total paintings to nine, which is just enough to have an exhibition.’’
The nine watercolour paintings depict what the region looked like in the 1800s, including Taranaki Maunga.
But Carrick still believes there are more paintings by
Aubrey out there that they are yet to collect.
‘‘We know there is one of Mo¯kau,’’ she said. ‘‘We would love to know if there are more, if people have them in their houses.’’
The exhibition runs until August 15, and Carrick said it was a short display owing to the paintings’ vulnerability. Because they were watercolours, they have been professionally framed with special UV glass to stop fading.
‘‘We have to be careful about how longwe have them in the light for,’’ she said.