Art in Auckland

Sun (Auckland), Volume I, Issue 279, 15 February 1928, Page 13

Art in Auckland

i i | PRIVATE VIEW OF MR I j W. ROBERT JOHNSON’S I NEW ZEALAND WORK j l | A TALENTED AUCKLANDER W. Robert Johnson is a New Zealander of ability who might, with justification, be accused of viewing his native land through Australian spectacles. THE New Zealand painter who caused the art sensation of 1927 in Sydney presented a number of sketches of the Mangaweka district at' a “private view’’ this morning at the studio in the Victoria Arcade of Miss Minnie F. White. It is not Mr. Johnson’s intention, however, to dispose of his work, which he will carry back to Sydney with him later in the month. Auckland art-lovers, however, should be grateful to Mr. Johnson for this opportunity of viewing his latest offerings. The exhibition will be open for a week. Mr. Johnson’s tour was an intensely interesting experiment. As it so happened New Zealand could not have presented herself to the painter more devoid of her natural colouring. Several of the pictures on view might quite easily have been painted in his beloved New South Wales. The smoky atmosphere, for instance, of the Kawhatau valley, with its intensely blue distance, might be that of the South Coast. AN INTERESTING EXPERIMENT “The Dress Circle, Kawhatau,” is an excellent example of Mr. Johnson’s flair for design—the winding stream, which from time immemorial has risen and fallen unions the plateau-ledged valleys, finding its way from its mountain source to the sea. There are glimpses, too, of Bucklands, and territory adjacent, in which the arid Australian pasture, and an intense feeling of heat, are suggested. Even the partly-opened pohutakawas cannot entirely remove that impression. Mr. Johnson’s forceful work, created in his own country after his successful grappling with Australian atmospheric difficulties, is peculiarly interesting. It should constitute the "one man” show of the year in Auckland. Miss White and Miss Eise, who issued the invitations for to-day’s “view,” provided morning tea for their guests, who included the president of the Society of Arts (Mr. A. S. Boyd) and Mrs. Boyd. Mr. W. Page Rowe (chairman of the Sketch Club), and many Auckland painters. E.R.