Loading

Taranaki depicts a co-operative dairy factory in Midhirst, the tiny farming community in north Taranaki. Christopher Perkins noticed the way the almost perfectly conical form of Mount Taranaki dominated the surrounding landscape.

Aware of how the 19th-century Japanese artist Hokusai paid homage to Fujiyama, Perkins fuses elements of Japanese ukiyo-e design into his painting, flattening the forms into geometric planes and intersecting diagonal lines. His reduction of the scene to such simplified elements converts Mount Taranaki into a symbol of the region’s identity.

See more detail about this artwork

Details

  • Title: Taranaki
  • Creator: Christopher Perkins
  • Creator Lifespan: 1891 - 1968
  • Creator Nationality: New Zealand; England
  • Creator Gender: Male
  • Creator Birth Place: Peterborough, England
  • Date Created: 1931
  • Subject: Taranaki, New Zealand
  • Place Part Of: New Zealand
  • Physical Dimensions: w914 x h508 mm (Without frame)
  • Artist biography: Christopher Perkins was born in England in 1891 and lived in New Zealand for five years between 1929–34. He was a graduate of Slade School of Art, London and came to New Zealand to take up a teaching position at Wellington’s Technical College. Perkins exhibited regularly with the New Zealand Academy of Fine Arts from 1929 to 1933.
  • Type: Painting
  • Rights: Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tāmaki, purchased 1968
  • External Link: Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tāmaki
  • Medium: oil on canvas

Get the app

Explore museums and play with Art Transfer, Pocket Galleries, Art Selfie, and more

Flash this QR Code to get the app
Google apps