Lauren Lysaght: The Nita Gini Project

4 November 2011 – 14 January 2012

The Nita Gini Collection is an assembly of unorthodox objects, the unlikely heirs to a legacy of New Zealand’s Crown Lynn tradition. Lauren Lysaght has painstakingly constructed each of these items by hand, using cardboard, plaster of Paris, wood veneer, and other found materials, and drawing on the memory of her grandmother Nita Gini’s collection of ceramics. Veering dramatically from the formality with which collections are often presented, the exhibition adopts a brassy, roguish and indomitably homemade aesthetic to consider objects we often call ‘precious’, in a pleasingly irreverent light. Larger-than-life, this work continues a story where the objects have almost become characters in their own right. The Crown Lynn narrative is far from complete; in The Nita Gini Collection it carries on, lively and exultant.

Image: Lauren Lysaght, Swan Lineage, work in progress, 2009-10. Courtesy of the artist.
Opening event: Saturday 5 November 2011, 12-4pm. Light refreshments served.

Public events:

Saturday 5 November, 12-4pm
Exhibition launch event, light refreshments served
1pm Sydney-based enthusiast Tony Carr talks about his close friend, researcher Richard Quinn, whose efforts to preserve an important part of West Auckland's ceramic history have resulted in a unique collection now administered by the Portage Ceramics Trust.
2pm Trish Clark, daughter of Crown Lynn founder Tom Clark, discusses the family's own collection of Crown Lynn and provides personal insights and recollections into the company’s development.

Saturday 12 November, 1pm
Artist Lauren Lysaght talks about her exhibition, The Nita Gini Project.

Saturday 19 November, 1pm
Artist Lisa Reihana and curator Andrew Clifford discuss the cultural implications of Crown Lynn’s use of Māori motifs for their highly collectable Wharetana ware.

Saturday 26 November, 1pm
Ceramic artist and Arts Laureate John Parker talks about his work and the inspiration he has taken from Crown Lynn designer Ernie Shufflebotham and Wedgwood’s Keith Murray.

Saturday 3 December, 1pm
Collectors Alison Reid and Brian Ronson discuss the fine art of collecting ceramics and their mutual obsession with Crown Lynn.

Saturday 10 December, 1pm
Potter Peter Lange talks about the importance of bricks, which have become a key ingredient in his recent work, including new public installations in New Lynn where Crown Lynn and Amalgamated Brick and Pipe Company Ltd were once based. The bricks that make up the distinctive exterior of the Gus Fisher Gallery, were manufactured by Amalgamated Brick and Pipe Company.

Saturday 17 December, 1pm
Mary Morrison and Billy Apple discuss their collections of Fiesta ware and Dorothy Thorpe tableware.

Saturday 7 January, 1pm
Join us for a free walking tour of Crown Lynn sites in New Lynn, including the Ambrico Place kiln, new public art works, and the future site of the Portage Ceramics Trust centre. Meet at 1pm on the New Lynn Public Library forecourt, not far from the New Lynn train station.

Saturday 14 January, 1pm
Staff of the Portage Ceramics Trust talk about the Richard Quinn Collection and the Trust’s plans to establish a museum for the collection close to the site of the of the Crown Lynn works.

All exhibitions and events are free and take place at the Gus Fisher Gallery unless otherwise noted.