Before leaving Wellington to explore the rest of the North Island, Stan and I attended as many New Zealand Festival events as we could. The biennial Festival offered a diverse selection of theater, dance performances, concerts, operas, and art exhibitions (http://festival.co.nz/).
In our travels around town, we often crossed Wellington’s Civic Square with its seemingly gravity-defying artwork:
Among stellar Festival events:
The Batsheva dance company from Israel earned six curtain calls with its electric performance.
In one of the opening numbers, the curtain rises to reveal both male and female dancers wearing Hasidic-like attire: black hats and suits, and white shirts. The dancers sit in a semi-circle on folding chairs. After a brief poem-like introduction in French, they chant a vaguely Israeli sounding song, while performing hyper-fast routines on, above, and around their chairs. Unexpected events occur: one dancer falls to the floor with a thud, picks himself up, and slides back into his chair. Later, another stands on his chair. I won't tell you what happens next. Watch it yourself: it's the 2nd dance at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bk-odQ-23_4.
We saw a performance in Russian, with surtitles, based loosely on the play within-a-play of Pyramus and Thisbe from Shakespeare’s Midsummer Night’s Dream. At the start, noisy workers dragged a 40-foot tree trunk from the back of the theater to the stage. Others threw vines from the balcony, to further define the forest. They then carted in huge containers, and assembled the contents—large body parts—into 20-foot tall puppets, Pyramus and Thisbe, They then manipulated the puppets to act out their story. Meanwhile, other actors meandered on and across the stage—the play’s audience—and commented in English on what they saw. I haven’t yet mentioned the troupe of ballerinas dancing a scene from Swan Lake (http://festival.co.nz/a-midsummer-nights-dream-as-you-like-it/).
In another unusual performance, the 10 Maori women in Stones in Her Mouth, addressed cultural issues, including physical and sexual abuse, through poetry and dance (http://festival.co.nz/stones-in-her-mouth/).
One night, Stan and I hopped on the train to Paraparaumu (say it out loud; it has a nice ring), to see a friend of mine, Philippa Gander, and her partner Nigel Parry perform folk music, as openers for British folk singer Jez Lowe in a local club. When not singing or playing one of several instruments, including an ocarina and a hurly-gurly, Philippa directs the Sleep/Wake Research Center at Massey U in Wellington.
While in Wellington, I saw a terrific jewelry exhibit at Te Papa, the national museum of New Zealand. Bone Stone Shell: 25 years on included works from a legendary 1988 exhibition of contemporary jewelry crafted from the New Zealand and Pacific area materials named in the title. It also included new work exploring cultural identity.
Among the newer work, I admired Areta Wilkinson’s large brooches, perhaps 5 x 6 inches, mainly brass (2006). These silhouette self-portraits explore the role of Maori cultural elements in the modern world. One brooch shows her wearing a simple dress, its uneven hem suggesting woven flax. In another, she’s sitting on a modern chair, at work on a laptop, her feet clad in high heels. Draped across the back of the chair are a pair of Poi balls on strings, devices used in classic Maori women’s dance routines that resemble baton twirling.
Other new pieces included brooches Jacqui Chan made with materials salvaged from the 2011 Christchurch earthquake. She invited Christchurch residents to walk through the city holding one of these pieces, gaining a different and perhaps forward-looking way to see their devastated city.
For photos and more info on the exhibit, see http://arts.tepapa.govt.nz/on-the-wall/bone-stone-shell.
Before leaving Wellington, we visited Otari Wilton’s Bush, a garden and nature center that focuses on preserving indigenous species (http://wellington.govt.nz/recreation/gardens/otariwiltons-bush).
We finally packed up our rental Rav4, and started on our exploration of other sights on the North Island. We’ll report on those soon.
Kia Ora,
Lynne and Stan
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