Trust gets Mirek display materials

Moving the display materials out of Mahara Gallery are from left: Satty Singh, Colin Davies, Pamella Annsouth, Suzanne McAllen (a former pupil of Mirek Smíšek) and Rangi Kauri.

Plinths and shelving at Mahara Gallery that displayed the work of Mirek Smíšek (pictured right) are going to the trust setting up an arts centre in honour of the pioneering potter.

They were for displays in the 2009 landmark Mahara Gallery exhibition of the artist’s work that toured to 14 museums and galleries around New Zealand.

Staff realised during planning for the rebuild of the gallery that has just begun, that the plinths, shelving and some other gallery fittings would not be needed when Mahara reopened in early 2023.

“I wanted to find an appropriate new home and with the Mirek Smisek Arts Trust developing the site at Te Horo to honour the potter’s legacy, we didn’t have far to look,” says Mahara director Janet Bayly.

The trust was happy to receive the items.

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“We are very grateful to Mahara for the gift,” says Smíšek trust patron Pamella Annsouth. “Our plan is to re-house these shelves and plinths in a new building at the remaining property in Te Horo where Mirek constructed the beehive kilns, which have needed to be relocated east because of the construction of the new expressway.”

Transport agency Waka Kotahi has funded the kiln move and rebuild project. The agency will also prepare the historic railway station that was moved on site in the 1970s. It will be used as a dwelling for a resident potter.

The shelves and plinths were originally designed by Gary Freemantle, the curator of the Mirek Smíšek 60 Years 60 Pots exhibition at Mahara Gallery to display Mirek’s unomis and saltglazed pieces. The trust collected the display material just days before the contractor moved onto the Mahara site.

The trust’s aim is to create a site that honours the Smíšek legacy, is able to hold exhibitions, teach aspiring potters and be a retail outlet for ceramics and the art of tangata whenua.

Mirek’s work was strongly influenced by his experience in Nazi prison and labour camps in his native Czechoslovakia during and immediately after the Second World War. He emigrated to Australia in 1948 and began his artistic career in Canberra and Sydney.

He moved to New Zealand in 1951 and became the country’s first studio potter after establishing a pottery in Nelson in 1954. He moved to the Kāpiti Coast in 1968.

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Saturday 26 February

11am Taiko Drummers 11am The Zane & Deggie Show 12pm Harcourts Big Dig* 1pm Kites behind boats* 2pm Taiko Drummers 3pm Tui Tahere-Katene and James Stent 4pm The Zane & Deggie Show 5pm Close

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