Maori Village, Waikato Basin
Maker
Walter Wright
Production date
Unknown
Late 19th Century
Description
A typical painting by Walter Wright, this pastoral scene provides a valuable insight into the way many Maori whare (dwellings) and storehouses were constructed around the turn of the 20th Century.
Walter Wright (1866–1933), along with his brother Frank, came to Auckland from Nottinghamshire with their mother in 1877. Although he initially worked as an upholsterer, Walter was a quiet, somewhat shy gentleman who was determined to make a living through art. Subsequently the two brothers became professional painters, selling works to tourists and teaching classes of young women. While exhibiting regularly for many years in the Auckland Society of Arts, their paintings were shown alongside luminaries such as Goldie, Frances Hodgkins and John Weeks. Both brothers were keen landscape photographers who used such images to plan the paintings they made in their studios. Walter was more interested in including human subject-matter than Frank. In 1908 they published New Zealand, a book of 75 colour reproductions, with a text by William Pember Reeves, and their watercolours were included in the publication Oceania [1911].
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Object detail
Late 19th Century
495 x 745mm (image)
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