A FRESH CANVAS
At Toi Tauranga Art Gallery, the new Creativity Centre offers a welcoming space to slow down and explore.
WORDS JO-MARIE BAKER | PHOTOS BRYDIE THOMPSON, IAN HUTCHINSON + SUPPLIED
Angie Ogilvy-Clark, education lead at Toi Tauranga Art Gallery.
Hands-on creativity sparks curiosity and joy, and Toi Tauranga Art Gallery’s new Creativity Centre is now becoming a central city haven for tamariki and adults alike.
“Creating art is about communicating in a visual sense,” explains Toi Tauranga Art Gallery director Sonya Korohina. “It’s another language and a way to express yourself and begin to engage with the ideas of others. In our fast paced, over-stimulated world, our Creativity Centre encourages us to really just pause, slow down and engage more deeply with what’s in front of us.”
Sonya Korohina, director at Toi Tauranga Art Gallery
This light-filled space is one of the highlights of the gallery’s recent redevelopment and is designed to host school groups, holiday programmes, weekend drop-in activities, workshops for all ages and more.
“Our Creativity Centre is a wonderful education space for our schools to come through during the day but it’s a flexible space for all ages, so we can host everything from an art history lecture series to a community group who want to make tapa cloths. Parents can also bring their children here at weekends and do hands-on art activities. There’s lots of lovely natural light coming in too which is really important as that often affects your creative mood.”
Adjustable tables and custom-designed seating can accommodate different heights, while the addition of sinks, cupboards, a data projector and multi-use peg boards mean the Creativity Centre can transform into a creative workshop space suitable for different ages and diverse interests, or be hired for meetings and events.
Sonya says the gallery’s education programme ties in with the national curriculum, with free teaching resources provided to schools before and after their visit. A bus paid for by funders is also available, making it easy for schools to travel to the city centre.
“It’s really important that children get to experience exhibitions rather than just looking at art on an iPad,” she says. “There’s nothing like actually being able to view a painting with a lot of detail in it or seeing the brush marks that the artist has made.
“Our education staff are all trained teachers who also come from art backgrounds. They develop workshops and programmes that relate directly to the shows that are within the gallery, so that might include clay making, sculptures, painting or even screen printing. Each child leaves with an artwork they have created in response to something they have seen that day.”
The gallery is currently seeking a naming partner for the Creativity Centre and is keen to hear from interested businesses or organisations. “It’s a wonderful way to give back to the community and to our next generation as well. It’s also an opportunity to be aligned with creativity, innovation, toi Māori and design, and have that reach out into our schools and local families.”
“We’ve also developed an interactive ‘Curiosity Guide’, which is a free booklet for all ages. There’s a couple of pages for each artist, and you can literally spend all day drawing, painting and moving. There’s even a page that encourages you to move like a worm based on one exhibition. Our Curiosity Guide allows children and adults to have a more enriched and deeper experience at the gallery.”
An artistic treasure hunt also awaits young visitors. Four ‘wonderboxes’ are now hidden in the walls of the gallery, with small symbols the only clue that something lies inside. “When you find and open each door, all of which are at the height of children, there’s a little exhibition hiding there, all lit up, to view. We’ll be changing them out from time to time so artists are regularly being commissioned for a wonderbox installation.”
Sonya says the gallery’s vision is for the Creativity Centre to become a lasting creative legacy for Tauranga Moana, making it a place of innovation and community pride.
“We’re excited to now have a dedicated space that’s purpose-designed for creativity in the city centre. It engages all the senses and promotes lifelong learning, creativity and wellbeing for our whole community.”
