Sculpture On-Shore Spam!

Sunday 23 November

While Louis and Sara took the first two shifts at the hospital with Helen (making slow progress), Nickie, Russ and I joined the throngs heading over the bridge to the Sculpture On-Shore exhibition at Fort Takapuna. This biennial exhibition has long been a favourite of mine and it was lovely to catch it on its last day. Over 120 sculptures along an open air trail around the headland and another 90 or so smaller pieces inside the Fort. This season did not disappoint with some stunning artworks, interesting themes, a huge variety of materials and styles and a beautiful day and location to showcase the pieces. We spent a leisurely couple of hours or so strolling around them all, wishing we had a spare $80k or so to spend on our favourite works, and marvelling at artists’ creativity.

The first group of images above celebrates the many Māori related installations - some carved by Māori artists, other inspired by cultural themes.

Then there were a large number of animal and bird themed sculptures in so many different media - corten steel was a popular material (elephants and birds in particular). The dog with his stick "The Botanist" made me so happy - he reminded me of our lovely Toby.

Nature's own beauty was captured in these flora inspired sculptures - I loved the giant polished wood seed pods, filled with ceramic seeds.

Humans and human like creatures were represented in so many ways - some beautiful, some funky, and some downright scary!

Assorted random themes - including several interactive seated sculptures, the beautiful uplit carved fantail traffic cones and a colour-coordinated structure of old bee hives. The frog on the bench was an interesting political statement in amphibian form;

MP Shane Jones once approved a mine which would destroy the habitat of a rare frog saying “goodbye Freddie!” 🐸 it’s happening again in Coromandel in 2025.

Local schools were invited to submit artworks - the first two montages above were school installations, and the painted, decoupaged and carved oars were my favourite of the indoor exhibition.

My two absolute favourite sculptures were the royal recycled kingfisher and the pair of polished stone huia - but so many others caught my eye and imagination.

Cheeky lunch at Chateaubriand then the Fernandi dropped me off at the hospital to join Louis & Amy for the afternoon stint.

Helen was still in pain and restless, but managed a few hours of sleep which was good. I snuck out late afternoon for a walk in the Domain and a visit to the Wintergardens.

The vibrant floral displays at the Wintergarden were just glorious - I would love to have spent hours wandering around, but a quick visit filled my heart at this difficult time.

Sara took over from us around 6ish and we joined the gang for “Raglan Burgers” to celebrate the start of Jeremy’s new job on Monday.

Quick spa dip then we tumbled into bed to rest up before the next hospital marathon.