On Banks Peninsula in Canterbury fingers of lava have created a landscape of many deep bays and rugged hills. This is the distinctive setting of our next story and one that has made a deep impression on artists.
Artist Louise Menzies' latest exhibition Purple Cliffs, Blue Hills is to be found at the restored Stoddart Cottage in Diamond Harbour, birthplace of a leading 19th and 20th century impressionist painter Margaret Stoddart. It is now a living gallery and museum.
The cottage is a short ferry ride from Lyttleton on the Peninsula, and Menzies' exhibition features ferry timetables, late 19th century boot fragments, and different types of trails across the landscape, with scarves the artist's main canvas..
In its concerns the exhibition travels further around the peninsula to Menzies Bay, the namesake of Louise Menzies' ancestor, JH Menzies. He was a renowned Victorian carver, known for his work in the church at Little Akaroa. A branch of Louise's family have lived on the peninsula since the 1870s.
The works are the result of time spent at nearby Karearea Cottage on the Stoddart Cottage-Purau artists residency in 2023.
Louise Menzies joined Culture 101 in Tāmaki Makaurau Auckland.
Purple Cliffs, Blue Hills is on at Stoddart Cottage until March 30.
