LAYLA WALTER

Woven Rimmed Vase #12 (2015)

cast glass, size (h x ø): 330 x 190 mm

Small Woven Bowl #8 (2015)

cast glass, size (h x ø): 90 x 255 mm

Pohutukawa - Cape Colville #1 (2015) cast glass, size (h x ø): 290 x 165 mm

Saddleback - Tiritiri Matangi #1 (2015)

cast glass, size (h x ø): 250 x 330 mm

Pohutukawa - Cape Colville #2 (Karekare) (2015)

cast glass, size (h x ø): 290 x 165 mm

Open Bowl - Woven Interior #30 (2015)

cast glass, size (h x ø): 145 x 245 mm

Kokako #10 (2015)

cast glass, size (h x ø): 240 x 330 mm

Woven Rimmed Bowl #25 (2015)

cast glass, size (h x ø): 90 x 345 mm

Open Bowl - Woven Interior #31 (2015)

cast glass, size (h x ø): 140 x 245 mm

Woven Zig-Zag Bowl #4 (2015)

cast glass, size (h x ø): 95 x 285 mm

Black Robin #20 (2015)

cast glass, size (h x ø): 120 x 125 mm

Kowhai - Coromandel Gold #1 (2015) cast glass, size (h x ø): 120 x 125 mm

Tui for Geoff #45 (2015)

cast glass, size (h x ø): 120 x 125 mm

Tui for Geoff #44 (2015)

cast glass, size (h x ø): 120 x 125 mm

Tui for Geoff #42 (2015)

cast glass, size (h x ø): 120 x 125 mm

This is a New Zealand show. Layla Walter’s interest in native flora, fauna and customary weaving practices of Maori has informed her practice from her early years. Glass is her medium. It’s not easy to interpret such themes through lost wax casting, but Walter has been working in glass casting for over twenty years. This exhibition reveals the outcome of a skilled and informed practice.

Glass is a bold medium, where colours glow and shapes are crisp; the material enhances the play of shadows through and around each work. The apparent simplicity Walter conveys through each vessel belies the complexity and unforgiving nature of the ten stage process of lost wax casting where negative renderings emerge into the final positive form.

Growing up in a creative world within the Coromandel, Walter learnt easily through her hands. Learning from local artists and craftspeople, and then immersing herself in the Diploma of Applied Arts followed by Bachelor in Design, Unitec (under Elizabeth McClure) brought her into contact with the ancient lost wax process. International glass artist Ann Robinson guided her too.

This show considers Walter’s practice through 21 years of design, although all works were cast in 2015. Themes of native birds, plants and flax weaving, gently guide the viewer through that passage of time. Kokako vessel designed in 2008 is a beguiling work. It was inspired by visits to Tiritiri Matangi, the wild life sanctuary. The shadowy form of the Kokako bird glows through the quiet tones of the blue-grey glass, the line of the bird echoed through the shape of the vessel.

The woven rimmed bowls, first designed in 1994, draw on Walter’s interest in customary Maori weaving practices, learnt as a child in the weaving house at Otatara Trust, Hawkes Bay. Refined through the guidance of Kahu Te Kanawa, Walter draws on the niho taniwha pattern used in taniko weaving and tukutuku panels. The saw-edged pattern, symbolising the teeth of the taniwha, is clearly articulated. Cross –cultural discussions emerge within her practice that considers how national identities play out within design and craft.

Layla Walter works within the environment of New Zealand; she is a glass artist first and foremost.

Justine Olsen

Curator of Decorative art and design Museum of

New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa

EXHIBITION PRICELIST

LAYLA WALTER

b. 1975, lives Auckland

Walter: Saddleback - Tiritiri Matangi #1 (2015)

"There is a visual balance between finely crafted detail and unadorned surface. Blossoms, stems and buds branch across simple forms, dignified and exposed. It is my intention that each work is peacefully engaging." – Layla Walter (1)

Layla Walter is a New Zealand glass artist and maker who has gained significant recognition for her distinctive and individual works in cast glass. A specialist in the "lost wax" technique, Layla Walter creates glass work featuring intricate flowers, stems and buds carved into the surface of vessels. Her works are significant because of the individuality of language, the personality of voice, the clear location of place to New Zealand and the South Pacific and "the sophisticated patient crafting they display" (2)

Walter worked for leading cast glass artist Ann Robinson from 1996 to 2011. In 1998 she graduated from Unitec in Auckland with a Bachelor of Applied Arts (Glass). In 2001, she received the AMP Achievers Award which allowed her to travel to the United States to further her glass studies. In the same year she received the Pilchuck Saxe Award, and was given a teaching assistant position at Pilchuck Glass School in the United States. In 2007, Walter received an invitation to present at the Glass Art Society in the United States and in 2008 was awarded the Creative Excellence Prize at the Molly Morpeth Canaday 3D Awards. More recently Walter was awarded for Black Robin at The Trust Art and Sculpture Awards (2014). She exhibits internationally, as well as throughout New Zealand. Her work appears in many private and public collections, most notably the Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa, Auckland Museum, Ebltoft Museum, Denmark, Sir Elton John’s private collection, and in many NZ embassies worldwide as part of the collection of the New Zealand Ministry of Foreign Affairs. (3)

Layla Walter's work has been noted in the influential annual National Business Review of New Zealand Art as worthy of investment. In a rare achievement, her glass has been selected on six separate occasions for the Corning Museum of Glass - New Glass Review, where thousands of artists apply for inclusion in a specially selected annual list of only 100 artists, whose are at the leading edge of current and relevant glass practice today (1997, 1999, 2005, 2009, 2012 and 2014). She was included as one of only two object makers in Richard Wolfe's curated exhibition Our People - Our Land alongside a wealth of premier New Zealand artists including C.F. Goldie, Sir Peter Siddell, Graham Sydney, Terry Stringer, Michael Smither, Nigel Brown, Karl Maughan and Ray Ching. (4)

1. Layla Walter, Bio, 2015, retrieved from http://www.laylawalter.com/bio

2. Helen Schamroth, Layla Walter I SOLO 2002, Masterworks Solo Exhibition Brochure, 2002.

3. Layla Walter, Bio, 2015, retrieved from http://www.laylawalter.com/bio.

4. Ibid.

Layla Walter 2015 CV milford galleries queenstown www.milfordgalleries.co.nz

Layla

LAYLA WALTER

b. 1975, lives Auckland

EDUCATION

1998 Bachelor of Design 3D-Glass. Unitec Institute of Technology, Auckland, NZ

1995 Introduction to Maori Fibre Weaving, UIT, NZ

SELECTED SOLO EXHIBITIONS

2015 Conversations, milford galleries queenstown

Pacific Light, Avid Gallery, Wellington

2014 Pacific Flower, Corbans Art Estate, Auckland

2010 Second Harvest, William Traver Gallery, Seattle, USA Harvest, AVID Gallery, Wellington

2008 Blue Bird, Anna Bibby Gallery, Auckland

2006 Camellia, William Traver Gallery, Seattle, USA

2005 Flower, William Traver Gallery, Seattle, USA

Water Lily, AVID Gallery, Wellington

2004 Layla Walter, Anna Bibby Gallery, Auckland

2003 Woven Vessel, William Traver Gallery, Seattle, USA

2002 Layla Walter, Masterworks Gallery, Auckland

2000 Thread Line, AVID Gallery, Wellington

1998 Graduation Show, The Gully Lounge, Auckland

1996 Solo Sponsorship Show, Auckland

SELECTED GROUP EXHIBITIONS

2015 MIG + Layla Walter, Allpress Gallery, Auckland Encounter, New Zealand Design and Decorative Arts Permanent collection, Auckland Museum Bird Show, The Vivian, Matakana

2014 Spring Catalogue, milford galleries queenstown

The Nature of Things, Avid Gallery, Wellington

The Review, milford galleries queenstown

Value, Masterworks Gallery, Auckland

2013 Show, William Traver Gallery, Seattle, USA

Stanley Palmer & Layla Walter, Melanie Roger, Auckland

Familiar, Avid Gallery, Wellington

2011 The Nature of Things, Schack Art Center, Everett, Washington, USA Kirsty Gorman, Peter Peryer and Layla Walter, Melanie Roger Gallery, Auckland William Traver Artist Show, GAS, Portland, USA

2010 Group Exhibition, Anna Bibby Gallery, Auckland Richmond Rd Studio, Piece Gallery, Matakana

Putiputi, the Flower in Contemporary New Zealand Art, Hastings City Art Gallery

2009 Glass, Ann Robinson, Michael Crawford and Layla Walter, BlackBarn Gallery, Napier

Inspiration, William Traver Gallery, Seattle, USA

Luminaries, Sabbia Gallery, Sydney, Australia

Small Works, AVID Gallery, Wellington

Group Show, Anna Bibby Gallery, Auckland

2008 Richmond Road Glass, Form Gallery, Christchurch

A Model Assembly, Artis Gallery, Auckland

Group Show, Anna Bibby Gallery, Auckland

2007 An Exhibition of Work Utilising Light, Artis Gallery, Auckland

The Gift Exchange, Dowse Art Museum, Lower Hutt

25th Annual Arts & Crafts Exhibition, Ron Sang Gallery, Auckland Vessel, Masterworks Gallery, Auckland

2006 Wild Things, Masterworks Gallery, Auckland

Glass, Anna Bibby Gallery, Auckland

Contemporary Glass, Masterworks Gallery, Auckland

2005 International Glass Exhibition, The Laura Russo Gallery, Portland, USA

A Matter of Substance - NZ Glass, Kensington Gallery, Adelaide, Australia

Layla Walter 2015 CV milford galleries queenstown www.milfordgalleries.co.nz

2004 New Zealand Glass, Masterworks Gallery, Auckland

Southern Exposure, Ebeltoft, Denmark; Sargent Gallery, Wanganui; Objectspace, Auckland

Woven Image, AVID Gallery, Wellington

2003 Small and Precious, Masterworks Gallery, Auckland

Ranges of Inspiration II, Corbans Art Estate, Auckland

Fibre to Fairy Lights – Contemporary Responses to Kete Maori, Dowse Art Museum, Lower Hutt Glass Invitational NZ, touring exhibition, Milford Galleries Dunedin (8 November 2002 - 16 January 2003); Pataka - Porirua Museum of Arts & Cultures (23 February - 4 May 2003) & Rotorua Museum of Art & History (16 May - 17 August 2003)

2002 NZ Glass, Anna Bibby Gallery, Auckland

Red Black White, Anna Bibby Gallery, Auckland

Southern Lights, AVID Gallery, Wellington

2001 The Cast, touring exhibition, Lopdell House Gallery, Auckland; Sargeant Gallery, Wanganui; Whangarei Art Museum, Whangarei; Hawkes Bay Exhibition Centre, Hastings Lindsay Patterson, Jo Nuttall and Layla Walter, Masterworks Gallery, Auckland

New Artists New Work, William Traver Gallery, Seattle, USA

NZ Glass, Masterworks Gallery, Auckland

2000 A Survey of New Zealand Glass, Masterworks Gallery, Auckland

1999 Emerging NZ Glass, Parliment House, Wellington

The Best of New Zealand Glass AXIA Modern Art, Melbourne, Australia

Emerging NZ Glass, AVID Gallery, Wellington

1998 Norsewear Art Award Exhibition, Waipukurau

Royal Easter Show Glass Award Exhibition, Auckland

RFC Glass Prize Exhibition, Australia-wide

SELECTED AWARDS

2014 Second Prize, The Trusts Art & Sculpture Awards

2008 Creative Excellence Prize, Molly Morpeth Canaday 3D Awards

2001 Pilchuck Saxe Award, USA

AMP Achievers Award

1999 Pilchuck Glass School 1/2 Scholarship to attend Harumi Yukutake’s workshop

1998 Merit, Norsewear Ceramics and Glass Award

Merit, Royal Easter Show Glass Award

1996 West Auckland Federated Women’s Association Award

1995 Unitec Institute of Technology Student Scholarship

SELECTED COLLECTIONS

Auckland Museum, Auckland

Department of Foreign Affairs, NZ Embassies in Washington, USA; Tehran, Iran; Cairo, Egypt; Wellington Glasmuseet Ebletoft, Ebletoft, Denmark

Te Papa Tongarewa, Museum of New Zealand, Wellington

St Cuthbert's College, Auckland

Sir Elton John, UK

Wingnut Films, Fran Walsh and Peter Jackson

SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY

2014 New Glass Review 35, The Corning Museum of Glass, New York, USA

2012 New Glass Review 33, The Corning Museum of Glass, New York, USA

2009 New Glass Review 30, The Corning Museum of Glass, New York, USA

Bucknell, Carol, ‘Inspired by Nature’, Next Magazine, December 2009, pp. 76-79

2005 Ioannou, Noris, ‘Art Glass Breaking Ground’, The Advertiser (Adelaide, Australia), 9 May 2005, text and illus, pp 85

New Glass Review 26, The Corning Museum of Glass, New York, USA p60

2006 Le Vaillant, Louie, ‘A Good Eye,’ Metro Magazine, June 2006

2004 Southern Exposure Catalogue, Glasmuseet Ebletoft, text and illus p 62-63

Wong, Gilbert, ‘Art of Glass,’ Metro Magazine, September 2004

Newton, Katie, ‘Next Big Thing,’ Sunday Star Times, 12 September 2004

2003 MacLellan, Sarah, Glass Act, Pavement, April/May 2003, p30

2002 Lyndsay Swan, ‘Air New Zealand Panorama, October 2002

Layla Walter 2015 CV milford galleries queenstown www.milfordgalleries.co.nz

2001 Elliott, Moyra, ‘New Zealand Cast Glass 2001’, Object, (Australia) Craft Arts International 49 (Australia) article by Gerry King, pp70-71

2000 New Zealand Contemporary Cast Class, ‘The Cast,’ November 2001, p 13, 41 & 43

1999 New Glass Review 20, The Corning Museum of Glass, New York, USA, p102, 107

1997 New Glass Review 18, The Corning Museum of Glass, New York, USA, p 98

Layla Walter 2015 CV milford galleries queenstown www.milfordgalleries.co.nz