COLLECTION
Aratoi has a relatively small but interesting collection of art works and historic objects, many of which relate to the history of the Wairarapa Arts Centre, Aratoi’s predecessor. The nature of the collection has been dictated by the Trust’s reliance on donations and bequests. Before Aratoi was built, the emphasis was on collecting art works, as there was no adequate storage for historic objects. Now, with a modern collection store built to current museum standards, Aratoi is able to collect objects that tell the stories of the Wairarapa and its people, and to preserve them for future generations.
The first object purchased for the collection was a work by English sculptor Barbara Hepworth. Galliard - Forms in Movement was acquired in 1963 by a group of local people as the inaugural piece in the collection of the future Wairarapa Arts Centre, which opened in 1969. The sculpture gave director Rodney Wilson (now director of Auckland War Memorial Museum) the idea of holding a sculpture competition. This became the biennial Hansells Sculpture Awards, which took place throughout the 1970s and early 1980s, and are remembered by many of today’s top New Zealand sculptors as a seminal event in their careers. A number of works from the Hansells Awards are part of the Aratoi collection and some are also sited in the schools of Masterton.
In the 1970s the arts centre was home to the New Zealand Print Council. This also had an influence on the collection, which is rich in prints by leading New Zealand printmakers from that decade.
A major benefactor to the museum has been the Prior family of Masterton. Through the Norman Prior Bequest and Dr Ian Prior, they have donated a number of works by important New Zealand artists such as Colin McCahon, Toss Woollaston, John Drawbridge and Denis O’Connor (whose large slate sculpture Lachrimae - Sea of Tears can be seen in the foyer at Aratoi).
In 1982 local painter Roy Steer made a bequest of his life’s work to the arts centre. There are more than 1600 watercolours, paintings and drawings in the Roy Steer collection, and his work formed one of the opening exhibitions in the new museum.
From March 2006 Aratoi will host the Rutherford Trust’s collection of 20th century New Zealand art that includes paintings and a small number of sculptures. This will greatly enhance the potential for curating exhibitions in house.
Aratoi also has a small number of historic views of the Wairarapa by artists such as C. D. Barraud, Charles Aubrey and W. G. Baker.
Purchasing work by current Wairarapa artists is limited by the size of the acquisitions budget, but donations and fundraising have made possible the recent purchase of the winning work in the 2005 Wairarapa Review: Janet Green’s ceramic vessel ‘Loutrophoros’.
Another source of art works for the collection is the Friends of Aratoi, who set aside a percentage of their annual income from subscriptions and fundraising to purchase new works by local artists. Their most recent acquisition was a portfolio of photographs by Carterton artist Ben Cauchi.
Aratoi acts as kaitiake (guardian) to a growing collection of Maori taonga. There are several korowai (cloaks), including a kiwi feather cloak on loan from a local Pakeha family to whom it was given in the early 1900s. the collection also has three 19th century Gottfried Lindauer portraits of tipuna (ancestors) of local people - Retimana Te Korou, Hoani Rangitekaiwaho and Nireaha Tamaki.
In 2003, Aratoi received over 600 artefacts from the estate of local fisherman Russel Broughton. He had been an avid collector of taonga for many years, and his collection includes over 100 toki (stone adzes), as well as patu, mere, greenstone ornaments and tools, kete, carvings and a large number of bone objects from an archaeological dig on the coast at Glenburn. Although some artefacts in his collection were bought at auction and are of unknown provenance, a substantial number were found locally, and are part of the pre-European history of the Wairarapa.
Aratoi is now slowly accumulating objects relating to the natural and social history of the Wairarapa. A fine pair of North Island brown kiwi was donated in 1999, and a collection of fossils and geological specimens came from NIWA. Two papier maché Hallensteins delivery boys mark the passing of that store from the Masterton streetscape.
When objects are offered for the collection, they must go through a process of assessment by a collection committee. This committee decides whether the objects should be accepted, based on criteria that include local relevance, the condition of the object, and whether it is something already represented in the collection by a better example. There are some things we do not collect, including documents and photographs (the Wairarapa Archive collects these); technology, agricultural machinery and equipment and objects that can easily be borrowed for specific exhibitions.
The collection of objects relating to the region’s colonial and more recent past is gaining momentum as people recognise Aratoi as a place for the long term care and conservation of historical artefacts. As this collection grows, it makes possible the creation of exhibitions that tell the stories of the people of the Wairarapa, so that we can see who we are, where we have come from, and where we might go.
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