Writer
Writer
Listener – November 10, 2001
Two weeks before the publication of The Silent Migration, an impressive new book that recalls the great urban migration of Maori in the middle of the 20th century, Agnes “Bubs” Broughton had a stroke which was probably brought on by trying to catch the postman to post off a list of the people she wanted to attend the launch of the book at Wellington’s Pipitea Marae.… More,,,
Listener – October 27, 2001
Apollinaire, if I remember rightly, opined somewhere that the future popular press would be the venue for the best contemporary writing. I presume that he expected imaginatively written up-to-date reports on the psychological landscape would sit alongside the news of the day. Imagine it: novelists, essayists and poets on the full-time payroll of the media barons, with instalments of their work-in-progress published daily, weekly or monthly. … More,,,
Listener – September 1, 2001
One of our greatest songwriters, Wayne Mason, continues his love affair with the shape and shadow of New Zealand.
“I love New Zealand’s physical nature,” says Wayne Mason. “I adore the country. Recently, I hopped on a boat and then rode by bike over to Cape Farewell by myself.… More,,,
Listener – June 16, 2001
“Who are you? A poet or prophet or what?” This question the poet John Caselberg recalls was Colin McCahon’s first utterance to him when they met in McCahon’s studio in Christchurch in 1948. Caselberg was then 22 and McCahon was 29, and this meeting was the starting point of the most remarkable collaboration in the history of New Zealand art. … More,,,
Listener – June 9, 2001
What is it about 1950s and early 1960s popular culture that twenty- and thirtysomethings want to replicate? The style without the boring bits, perhaps. Watch Sex and the City and you’ll see sex-savvy starlets wearing 50s-style stiletto heels and drinking martinis, with lounge music notating their sexual escapades.… More,,,
Listener – April 14, 2001
“Intellectual bullshit artist” and “concept leader for art” Ian Wedde makes his comeback as a man of letters.
Ian Wedde is writing poetry again after a decade’s layoff. He rose out of the late 60s an intellectual bigwig, a key writer of his generation, the Big Smoke generation.… More,,,
Listener – February 17, 2001
“It’s not just a gallery, it’s something more than a gallery,” says Peter McLeavey. “I don’t quite know what a site is. I suppose it’s where something happens. I’ve never changed the walls. I’ve never done them up. I can look at these walls and I can sort of say: Billy Apple, 1976, Colin McCahon, Gordon Walters, Milan Mrkusich, Charles Tole.… More,,,
Listener – October 21, 2000
“Are we having funnn!” implores “The Legend” . “Yeaah,” chant the dancers. “You little beauuutees,” cries this country’s first rock’n’roll star Johnny Devlin.
“We” are at the Levin Cossie Club at Johnny’s Shake Rattle & Roll Dance Show. About a dozen dancers, including photographer Janet Bayly and myself, are on the dancefloor.… More,,,
Listener – September 9, 2000
Above the altar at St Luke’s Anglican in Waikanae, images of early patriarchs Wi Parata Te Kakakura and missionary Octavius Hadfield flank an image of St Luke in stained glass. Wi Parata, who was elected to Parliament as the member for Western Maori in 1871, gifted the land for St Lukes to be built.… More,,,
Listener – August 26, 2000
… More,,,“Our industry was football and experiments with space.
What we knew
what we understood
had no beautiful language at its service
lacked for artists and sculptors
what we knew was intimate
as instinct or memory .