Tina-Rae Carter goes to unusual lengths to dream up activities for Aratoi’s school holidays programme. This week she has been filling fish tanks with milk and shining torchlight through them. All will be revealed at the workshops but suffice to say she’s been experimenting with the play of light and other mind expanding optical effects in preparation for the workshops, happening next month.
These themes fit with Martinborough-based artist Annabelle Buick’s show ‘I See I Saw’ currently at the Windows Gallery. Tina-Rae will help the children get to grips with this, then show them how to do their own patterns and optical tricks.
“Annabelle has got right behind us and kindly supplied boxes of wooden blocks cut especially to help her work out her complicated tesselation artworks,” says Tina.
Tesselations use one or more geometric shapes to form interlocking patterns. These can be seen in a wide range of art and craft contexts, from Roman mosaics to Islamic tile decoration, quilting and wallpaper design. Annabelle takes tesselations into three dimensions by creating intricate clusters of blocks and fixing them to a backing surface. Some of her works are shown here.
Tina-Rae says the workshops will be mind-expanding for children. “One you start looking closely at patterns, as Annabelle has done, you start to see them everywhere you go, in your everyday surroundings, in nature as well as in art. They are kind of magical.”
Optical illusions are also fascinating for all ages, and there are many examples in Annabelle’s show, which is a contemporary take on traditional Maori and Pacific weaving techniques.
Children will be able to work with the blocks, paint on canvas and create light play on a surface to explore these themes. “As it’s Matariki, we’ll also be weaving some eight pointed stars, and talking about the essence of this time of year and what it means,” says Tina.
The workshops are suitable for children aged 7-13, and run 14-16 July, from 10am-1.30 pm
. Kids need to bring their lunch each day.
Cost: $75 per child for the three-day workshop (includes materials)
. Bookings essential at Aratoi
T: 06 370 0001.
Exhibitions at Aratoi: I See. I Saw, until 9 August; Selections from The Rutherford Trust Collection, until 16 August; Settling the Land: Order Out of Chaos, until 16 Aug; Wairarapa Whakaputa Mohio: Settling the Land, until 31 Dec.
Caption: Annabelle Buick’s block artworks, ’Taniko’ (bottom left); ‘Tapawha' (top middle) and ‘Chevron’ (right).
Wairarapa Museum of Art and History