Four local artists Sue Dent, Rob McGregor, Ashley Grant and Doreen McNeil are exhibiting work for two days only at Dent’s Pahoia Studio.
It’s the sort of thing you hope you won’t do – because you look a twit – show up a week early. Which I suppose is better than a week late. Artist Sue Dent does not bat an artistic eyelid as I beat a path to her door on a wet and windy Tauranga weekend. Although the exhibition is not on until the following week, Sue is happy to talk to me about her work.
Sue is a longtime artist. Although Sue says she has drawn all her life, she had “never thought she was any good”. It wasn’t until 1994 that she had her first lesson and realised she should have started developing herself and her talent “years ago”.
The style of the work hanging on the downstairs studio walls is diverse. Sue says she started as a watercolourist but moved to acrylics as it is “quicker” to paint. While her work has previously sold well and been sought after, Sue says sales of work have slowed over recent years as the number of street level galleries has diminished in Tauranga and surrounds. A Christchurch gallery has just approached Sue for work for an exhibition. I ask about website sales – “a recent sale to Australia”.
The exhibition Room 2 View has been organised by Sue at her home studio. She is sharing this exhibition with local colleagues who are well-known in the Bay of Plenty art world.
Ashley Grant, formerly of the Cargo Shed and Lightwave Gallery, will be showing his sculptural work. The legendary Doreen McNeil has a range of her identifiable abstracts and Rob McGregor examples of his similarly identifiable work. Sue says past sales she has organised have been hugely successful with hundreds of people coming out to Pahoia.
The downstairs studio also host regular Monday art teaching sessions by Sue. A cross-section of artists and those interested in arts tuition are regular attenders.
This will be a wonderful pre-Christmas opportunity to see the work of four Tauranga based artists in an informal gallery setting. Sue Dent’s studio, the base for the exhibition, is at 10 Old Highway, Pahoia. Sue’s home is right at the end of Old Highway where it joins Esdaile Road. If you travel from Te Puna or Bethlehem north along State Highway 2 and turn left into Esdaile Road, just past the Pahoia School is the junction with the Old Highway. This is the simplest way to get to the property. The drive is tarsealed and rises from the roadway but there is a large parking area at the top of the drive behind the house.
Room 2 View is open for two days only Saturday 28th November 2015 from 10am to 6pm and Sunday 29th November from 10am to 5pm.
Sue can be contacted on 07 548 1305 Her website is www.suedent.vc.net.nz
Rosemary Balu. Rosemary Balu is the founding and current editor of ARTbop. Rosemary has arts and law degrees from the University of Auckland. She has been a working lawyer and has participated in a wide variety of community activities where information gathering, submission writing, community advocacy and education have been involved. Interested in all forms of the arts since childhood Rosemary is focused on further developing and expanding multi-media ARTbop as the magazine for all the creative arts in the Bay of Plenty, New Zealand.
