It is hard to care about much else when the morning’s headlines included “whole civilization will die”. It's the latest in a quickly escalating series of threatened and real war crimes and human rights violations in the Middle East which have unravelled since 2023, though the conflicts and atrocities stretch back decades. Meanwhile in Ukraine, Russian forces continue to take territory and lives, and violence is cropping up elsewhere in the world too. It seems that the international rules-based order that emerged after World War II is crumbling. Now a few powerful men, with military might at their disposal, are running riot. Death and violence rule. And I’m here to talk to you about art.
There’s never a shortage of guilt when we compare our own lives to images of those in war torn countries. A sense that to carry on as usual is quiet complicity. In her book Orwell’s Roses Rebecca Solnit makes a case against arguments that say it's immoral to enjoy life while others suffer are puritanical, and imply that what we have to offer is our own joylessness, rather than anything practical. Underlying those guilts and arguments is an ideology that pleasure and beauty run counter to wanting better for the world, and that valuing them is decadent and indulgent. It's the sort of thinking we’re used to coming up against in the arts, the sort of embedded values that lead people to think arts are a nice to have rather than a necessity.
As a counter to that kind of thinking, some left-wing movements in the 1900s adopted the symbolism of bread and roses. They fought for everyone’s rights to life’s bread, meaning homes, shelter, security, food and the basic necessities, and for life’s roses, music, education, nature, books, art – the things that represent pleasure, leisure, and a life beyond survival. Roses, in their own way, are framed as essential rights too.
The central character in Solnit’s rambling book is George Orwell, the English writer most famous for his novel Nineteen Eighty-Four that examines the dangers of totalitarianism. He was politically minded and prolific, pumping out critical writing on society, politics and labour from a (mostly) democratic socialist lens alongside his books. What he is less known for is being a gardener who tended closely to roses. When you come back to his writing, older and perhaps a little less impressionable to radical political ideas, you notice it’s peppered with beauty. Clear, concise prose of course, but also vivid descriptions of the natural world – toads’ golden eyes in spring, fields of golden hops and wood smoke, a thrush singing in the woods. Like his real-life roses, it's easy to view them as unnecessary flourishes.
But as he revealed in his polemic essay from 1946, Why I Write, “I could not do the work of writing a book, or even a long magazine article, if it were not also an aesthetic experience.” Though it's easy to see more overt political purposes in his writing, he also felt the need to hold onto a worldview he acquired in childhood, one based on a love for the “surface of the Earth”. It kept him going, and it also preserves the roses of life, the things worth living for, in his writing. In doing so there’s a vision of life not as being solely utilitarian but something far more precious.
Perhaps we can consider the balance of our own lives as a piece of Orwell’s writing. There are the explicit arguments we make for the kind of world we want – informing ourselves, donating money or our presence towards the causes we believe in, voting – and the implicit values we hold about life and how the world should be – taking the time to notice beauty, tending to things that bring pleasure, engaging with the arts. One does not detract from the other, and nowhere does pointless joylessness come in.
All that is to say that in the shitshow we find the world in, artists still continue to be artists, and here is the week’s news.
💥News on the wire
St James Theatre project expanded to include new basement venue
The St James Theatre restoration project is on budget and on track for completion 2028. Things seem to be going so well that the scope has been expanded to include a new basement entertainment space. During groundworks to prepare the basement for new bathroom and fire egress facilities, the project team determined the creation of a dedicated basement entertainment space was viable and an efficient use of space. The basement black box venue is to be a more intimate performance and events space. The iconic main theatre auditorium will hold a capacity of approximately 1480 in a fully seated configuration and 2400 in a standing mode, and the new basement venue will be able to accommodate up to 1200 attendees. The new basement venue will be built in parallel with the main theatre, aiming to have doors open sometime in 2028, one hundred years after the theatre's original opening. More updates as things progress!
Te Whare Toi o Heretaunga Hastings Art Gallery art bus warmly welcomed
A free art bus, launched in November, provides free transport for eligible schools from Hastings, Napier and Central Hawke’s Bay to visit the gallery. It has already welcomed hundreds of students and teachers have said that the experiences have been “culturally rich” and given “new experiences they wouldn’t have had otherwise”.
The idea of the bus started with a simple idea, says the gallery’s Audience and Learning Manager Elham Salari. “Art should be accessible for everybody, especially our tamariki because they are the next generation of creative thinkers.” Schools had told the gallery that transport was the biggest barrier to visiting, so the solution presented itself clearly. The bus has been funded privately by a generous group of local patrons.
Tautai announce the return of Artists Across Borders
Tautai Pacific Arts Trust have announced their dedicated “top-up” funding opportunity for contemporary Pasifika artists based in Aotearoa is back for the year, with support from Creative New Zealand and Foundation North. The funding is dedicated to artists who have secured international invitations between April and December 2026, but may be facing financial barriers that make it difficult to take up these opportunities, although the majority of expenses must be already covered. Artists can request up to $4,000 from a total funding pool of $20,000 for things like airfares, insurance, accommodation, materials and other costs for exhibitions, residencies, public programming and other opportunities overseas.
Grace reopens at the Rationalist House
In February I told you about the gallery’s “slightly hazy timeline” to reopen in Autumn at their new location. Well, autumn must be here, because Grace has reopened in the Symonds Street Edwardian building with a show featuring work by Georgia Tikaputini Douglas Hood and Atarangi Anderson. The space is on the first floor, has freshly painted white walls, great natural light, hardwood floors, and a balcony where it looks to be important to wear a cap and speedy sunnies.
APRA mentees announced
14 mentees have been paired with experienced musicians and practitioners from across Aotearoa for one-on-one guidance. The mentees are Alice Tanner, Brian Norton, Briar Prastiti, Caleb Hickmott, George G Smith, Hayden Lam, Hemi Walker, Loimata Isaia, Miles Sutton, Ngāneko Eriwata, Olivia Reeves, Reuben Jelleyman, Sian Robertson and Zoe Scott. Each mentee was selected by a mentor, this year Angelo Munro, Grayson Gilmour, Gussie Larkin, Holly Arrowsmith, Coco Solid, John Psathas, Joost Langeveld, Lavina Williams, Noema Te Hau, Phoebe Vic, Salina Fisher, Steph Brown, Tiki Taane and Troy Kingi are lending their guidance to nurture skills and knowledge.
NZ Music contributed $932 million to GDP in 2024
A new report for Recorded Music NZ by PwC reveals that in 2024, the New Zealand music industry directly contributed $468 million to GDP and $928 million after accounting for multiplier effects. It directly employed around 2,730 people in full-time equivalent jobs and supported around 5,600 FTEs in total (once indirect and induced jobs are included). The majority of that activity is in live performance with radio broadcasting and retail following. Live performance is on the up, with 2024 revenues around 70% higher than pre-COVID19 levels.
The report also notes broader impact of music – personal enjoyment and wellbeing, national brand and cultural heritage, upskilling opportunities, talent pathways, aspirations and education, and local vibrancy – but does not attempt to quantify them.
Royal New Zealand Ballet to perform at the Royal Opera House, London
Four dancers, Principal Ana Gallardo Lobaina, Soloist Kirby Selchow, and Principals Joshua Guillemot-Rodgerson and Kihiro Kusukami, from the RNZB will be travelling to London this month to perform at the Royal Opera House as part of the International Draft Works programme from 16-18 April. The dancers will perform Ultra Folly – a contemporary work by RNZB choreographer Sarah Foster-Sproull. Originally created for the Company in 2020 and previously performed in Tutus on Tour, Ultra Folly is a finely detailed chamber ballet that explores human connection, intimacy and restraint. “Ultra Folly reflects a time when human interaction was both essential and uncertain,” says Foster-Sproull. “The choreography explores what it means to connect – physically and emotionally – when that connection feels fragile or even forbidden.”
👀 Further reading
Austin Haynes tells us about the star behind the kiwi song in Ryan Gosling’s new hit movie. Erima Maewa Kaihau had considerable political mana and used her music and voice to foster understanding between Māori and Pākehā.
A new state-of-the-art storage facility in Porirua offers secure, high‑spec storage of artworks, taonga, archival collections, scientific specimens, and other sensitive materials for major institutions or private collectors in climate-controlled conditions. Andrew Paul Wood gets into the nitty gritty.
In this month's Global Compass, we get a peek into a surge of NZ activity in Sydney, and Genista Jurgens reflects on missed moments to contribute to conversations as well as sharing the best international opportunities for artists.
New Zealand-born Samoan actor Jesme Fa'auuga shares how a baby girl helped him take a shot pursuing more than a stable income in this week's Shameless Plug.
