You look up and the longest day has gone, half the year has gone, and it’s nearly Matariki. The first chunk of 2026 has been textile rich, with exhibitions in a range of places, a play structured around former PM Helen Clark’s wardrobe, a new fashion event in Wellington and not least the CTANZ symposium and the winter issue of Context.
We’re in a bit of an exhibition and event lull at present, though Otepoti Dunedin is continuing to fly the flag. Tūhura Otago Museum has refreshed its Pacific gallery featuring a major textile work by Ana Teofilo, the carpet Moira White wrote about in the new Context, also featured in the Otago Daily Times Up the stairs in the Peoples of the World gallery, Pip Steel’s collection of boro has made it to Te Wai Pounamu after several showings in the north. Workshops and talks on and since the opening weekend have proved popular, and there will be more on the exhibition’s closing weekend 11 October. In July, we get to look forward to the 2027 ArtScience exhibition. This year’s theme is Once Upon a Time – Now, Then, Where, When explores the science of time. As this multi-media mingling of art and science is coordinated by a weaver (the indefatigable Pam McKinlay), textiles will as always be well-represented, and as well as the exhibition, Pam has another piece, Time Once Upon Us, on display at the Whitebox Gallery. One further bit of southern news is the call for entries for the 2027 iD Fashion shows, both for emerging designers and the collections.
Those not in Otago who miss these events might like to think about what they’re up to with an eye to Context – which will be #50! -and the 2027 symposium. The Context copy deadline is the end of August but please contact our editor, Alice Yu with your ideas for this special issue by the end of June. Also coming very soon, the call for papers for the 2027 symposium to be held 1-4 April next year in Mawhera Greymouth. The theme is In search of the fabulous idea; you can expect more details in your web and social feeds very soon.
Aside from a few jewellery exhibitions here and there, the hiatus of textiles to see gives a chance to catch up on background from some earlier in the year. Nelson’s Changing Threads competition returned after a break with awards announced 5 June. The exhibition at Refinery Artspace is on until 20 July, and there’s a video walkthrough of the finalists online at https://www.acn.org.nz/changing-threads. Also in Nelson is Taku Rau Tīkumu at the Nelson Provincial Museum, an exploration of the fibres of the mountain daisy and the mātauranga Māori, science, oral histories that attach to this plant. The exhibition is on until 2 August but if you can’t make, it, it featured on RNZ recently.
Fashion and the business thereof have also had more space online of late, with Emma Gleason doing great stuff on the Spinoff. In May, articles on the relationship of fashion and art (inspired by this year’s Met exhibition theme), and manufacturing shoes and clothes are worth looking out, as is a Newsroom piece on the NZ clothing industry. Not so local, a comprehensive guide to World Cup kit offers design insight to the patterns created for this year’s men’s FIFA tournament that might well even interest those who have no interest in actual football.
Discover more from CTANZ
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.