Whitianga Art Group Exhibition to showcase high quality local art

Summer Art Exhibition in Whitianga

The Whitianga Art Group’s Annual Summer Exhibition opens on Sunday 3 January 2022 with a wine and cheese evening starting at 6.00pm. The exhibition will be opened by this year’s guest artist Peter Nicholson. Open until Monday 31 January 2022, the exhibition will feature all new works by the 40 members created over the last twelve months. The Art Centre and Gallery on School Road will be open for approximately four weeks until Anniversary Weekend. 

Art Raffle

Each year there is a raffle of a painting donated by one of the Art Group members. The 2022 painting (pictured above) has been donated by Diliana Davenhill. Diliana, originally from Bulgaria, moved to New Zealand with her family from the UK in 2010. Diliana’s art was chosen to represent the Whitianga Art Group at the Showcase Exhibition during the 2017 Art Escape. Diliana prefers to work in acrylics for her pieces.

“I am inspired by the beauty and spectacular landscapes of the Coromandel Peninsula. Here I may choose from craggy mountain tops, countless beaches fringed by twisted Pohutukawa trees, estuaries, rivers and offshore islands.”

Diliana Davenhill – Artist

Guest Artist Peter Nicholson

The guest artist at the exhibition this summer is renowned and popular local artist Peter Nicholson.

Born in London 1935, Peter began learning to draw at an early age. He attended the Willsden School of art and the St Martin’s School of Art alongside a five-year apprenticeship in a leading London Commercial Art Studio. Peter began as a freelance artist in 1960. He emigrated to New Zealand in 1967 where he continued as a freelance artist and partnered in an advertising agency for a further twelve years.

Peter has won numerous national and international art awards. He is well known for his large murals in Katikati and in the township of Whitianga. The Joseph Banks and Endeavour Ship Mural, painted in 2019 in the town plaza as part of the Tuia250 celebrations commemorating Captain Cook’s visit to Mercury Bay, is Peter Nicholson’s eleventh mural.

About the Whitianga Art Group

The Whitianga Art Group has a long and rich history dating back to 1969.

New members are always welcome. Encouragement is provided in abundance to beginning artists and workshops are often arranged for tuition from other artists in the community.

Anyone is welcome to join in and the group have some materials available to get new members started. For more information please see the Whitianga Art Group page linked below.