On show 22 November to 23 February

The Portage Ceramic Awards is an annual exhibition of contemporary ceramics in Aotearoa. The award was established in 2001 and embraces the rich history of working with clay in West Auckland.

Portage 2024 includes 42 works by 40 artists, some of whom are well-established and have been finalists in the Portage many times before. For others, this is the first time entering the awards or exhibiting their work. Finalist works range from intimate functional objects to large-scale ephemeral installations. The concerns of the exhibited works are also diverse, embodying the natural world and the origins of clay, the intimate connection between Māori and whenua, the freedom of working with clay, and the precise technicalities of sculpting, firing, and glazing.

Portage Ceramic Awards 2024

On show 8 December to 9 March

Turumeke Harrington (b.1992, Kāi Tahu, Rangitāne) is a sculptor, jeweller, and installation artist. Her work engages with ideas of whakapapa, materiality, and space through the construction of large-scale sculptural installations which sit at the intersection of fine art and spatial design. With her characteristically bright, geometric forms, Harrington creates environments which are both playful and political.

Turumeke Harrington

STUMPING GROUND

Education Programmes and Workshops

Te Uru offers engaging learning opportunities for every art enthusiast. With scenic views of the surrounding landscape, our purpose built pokapū akoranga learning centre is an inspiring setting for learning how to make and think about art.

Ako - Learn

On show 16 February to 25 May

Photosynthesisers: Women and the lens includes photographs and videos produced since the 1960s by women artists living in Aotearoa and Australia. As the title suggests, the exhibition is centred on the specific, transformative relationship between women and lens-based media, identifying an enduring, intergenerational regional history via the photographs and videos of artists from Aotearoa, Australia, and Moana Oceania.

Photosynthesisers: Women and the lens

On show 16 February to 20 April

Soft Spot highlights three artists working with fibre-based materials in a range of forms, including rug making, embroidery, and soft sculpture. These tactile artworks evoke domestic spaces in their form and subjects, looking to functional objects and household chores as both personal and political subjects. Together, Kogachi, Ranginui and van Zon probe relationships, class structures and cultural heritage within the context of the objects and rituals which make up a home.

Claudia Kogachi, Ming Ranginui, Erica van Zon

SOFT SPOT

On show 9 March to 25 May

Jelena Telecki (b.1976) makes paintings, drawings, and sculptures that investigate the possibilities of representation and the ways it articulates the politics of personal and shared narratives. Informal and formal power dynamics, intimacy and violence, and how these are recognised and depicted are central to Telecki’s enquiry. Oil and Water reflects on the first two decades of Telecki’s practice (2005–2025) through the development of a new suite of paintings, retracing the figures and ideas central to past works through her primary mode of painting.

Jelena Telecki

OIL AND WATER