The nationally-recognised Field Collection of artworks — the catalyst for the redevelopment of Mahara Gallery in Waikanae — has moved from storage in the Paraparaumu public library to its new home in the gallery.
The collection is notable for the inclusion among its 44 works of 24 paintings by New Zealand’s most celebrated expatriate artist Frances Hodgkins.
Although Frances and her sister Isabel were born and raised in Dunedin, the collection accumulated in Kāpiti because Waikanae became the centre of family life in the years after Isabel married local businessman and politician, William Field.
It was preserved in later years by Isabel’s son and Frances’ nephew, Peter Field senior. After his and his wife Dorothy’s death, responsibility for the collection passed to the Field Collection Trust.
The redevelopment became a partnership project involving the Field Collection Trust, the Mahara Gallery Trust Board and Kāpiti Coast District Council.
The Field Collection Trust provided the collection, the Gallery Trust Board raised two-thirds of the capital cost and the council provided the land, one third of the capital cost and an annual grant towards operational costs.
The newly installed Field Collection will be the largest collection of Frances Hodgkins’ work in public ownership outside Te Papa, Auckland Public Art Gallery and the Dunedin Public Art Gallery.
“Just as Frances Hodgkins was an artistic wanderer who in spite of her itinerant nature, came to regard Waikanae as ‘ancestral’, there is great satisfaction in providing a permanent and easily accessible home for this significant collection of her works.
“And providing a home for the Field Collection has been the catalyst for achieving a significant advance in the quality of the service we can provide our community as the district gallery for Kāpiti.”