[Grant Newton]

I have received information about a photographic exhibition that will be of interest to trampers…. read on for more info:

Cheers
Grant

---

Our next exhibition is titled Boots&Suits ? tramper diptychs by Alan Knowles, from 1 – 25 October, and is supported by the Creative Communities Local Funding Scheme. It consists of 20 pairs of colour images, each showing a Wellington tramper in their day job and in the bush. Idiom just happens to be just around the corner from the Mt Victoria clubrooms used jointly by the Tararua Tramping Club, the Wellington Tramping and Mountaineering Club and the Wellington Catholic Tramping Club.

Alan Knowles says:
?I have photographed about 50 trampers, aged from 14 to over 80 years, on trips all over New Zealand. The images capture, in maximum detail, the clothing fabrics, skin texture, sweat, dirt and the effects of prolonged periods away from hot showers and civilisation. The raw images of these unkempt individuals ‘in the wild’ are contrasted with a matching photograph of each of them in the more genteel and sophisticated environments of their work or home.

?These men and women every week head for the bush to explore, route-find and occupy the hinterland for no other reason than the sheer pleasure of being there. They come from all areas of the social and employment hierarchy which are not easy to identify when camouflaged in tramping garb. But they are managers, labourers, teachers, housewives, public servants, tradesmen, schoolchildren, city councillors, shopkeepers?.?

The photographer
Alan Knowles is an active mountaineer and tramper, the former chairman of the Wellington section of the NZ Alpine Club, a member of the Tararua Tramping Club for ten years, and a member of the NZ South Georgia expedition 1984. One of New Zealand?s leading photographers, his work held is in many public and private collections. His most recent exhibition, at the Dowse Gallery, Lower Hutt, November 2002, was called Cookies, crackers and gingernuts and portrayed staff of the Griffins Biscuits factory.

Along with Swiss, Australian, Vietnamese and other New Zealand photographers, Alan?s work will appear in Photo Lightscapes, a travelling exhibition first shown in Geneva in 2000, and next in Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City in October 2003.

He is the author of many books and articles, most recently Wildflower City – Wellington New Zealand (2003) – “This book is a rare loveliness, a minor miracle, exquisite and quiet and kindhearted – really, it is a work of art.” Steve Braunias, NZ Listener, 22/2/2003

[Author]

Posts