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| Established | 1971 |
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| Location | Lower Hutt, New Zealand |
| Website | dowse |
The Dowse Art Museum (formerly the Dowse Art Gallery) is a municipal art gallery in Lower Hutt, New Zealand. [1]
Opened in 1971 in the Lower Hutt CBD, [2] the Dowse occupies a stand-alone building adjacent to other municipal facilities. The building was completely remodelled in 2013. [3] The Dowse's holdings generally focus on New Zealand artists of both national and local significance.
The Dowse Art Museum is named after Mayor Percy and Mayoress Mary Dowse, both of whom died prior to the museum opening. Percy Dowse served as the mayor of Hutt City from 1950 to 1970. He was a firm believer in the principle of having physical, social, and cultural facilities in modern cities and he initiated a building phase in the city that saw the construction of landmark buildings such as the War Memorial Library, the Lower Hutt Town Hall, and the Ewen Bridge. He championed the addition of an art gallery to the building spree. His wife, Mary Dowse, was the first president of the Hutt Valley National Council of Women. [4] She was also an ardent supporter of the arts. She teamed up with Elizabeth Harper from The Hutt Art Society, and the duo lobbied the City Council. They succeeded in their endeavour when, in 1963, the Council agreed to provide space for an art gallery. The gallery was originally housed in an extension of the War Memorial Library but after Mary died in a road accident in 1964 the City Council made a unanimous decision to honour her by constructing a new building for the art gallery. The museum was only partially completed when Percy died in 1970. [5]
Holdings include national figures such as Ralph Hotere, Colin McCahon, Don Peebles and Gordon Walters [19] as well as locally connected, nationally significant, artists as Rangi Hetet, [2] Rangimārie Hetet, [20] Gordon Crook and Hariata Ropata-Tangahoe. There have been strong exhibitions of modern Maori and Pacific artists and issues. [21] [22] The Dowse has a bust of Carmen Rupe by Paul Rayner [23] [24] and significant collections of jewelry by Alan Preston. [25] [26]
In the early days of the Māori King movement, the Te Āti Awa chief Wi Tako Ngātata commissioned the Tūwharetoa tribe to build around seven pataka (storehouses) to be observed as "pillars of the kingdom". [27] Nuku Tewhatewha is the only one extant. It was constructed around 1853 [27] at Naenae and carved by a nephew of Te Heuheu Tūkino IV. [12] In 1856, Wi Tako sold land including the pataka at Te Mako, Naenae to William Beetham and vested the pataka to his care. In 1888 Beetham's son George moved the pataka to the garden of his home in Moturoa Street in Wellington [28] [29] In 1912 it was shifted to Brancepeth Station at Masterton and looked after by descendants of William Beetham. [30] [a] In 1982 William Beetham's great-grandson Hugh Beetham decided that the pataka should be better protected, and offered it to the Dowse Art Gallery. [29] It was transported over the Remutaka Hill Road by truck to a new wing in the museum. [29] Then-director of the Dowse, James Mack, changed the name of the Dowse Art Gallery to the Dowse Art Museum mainly because of the donation of the pataka, stating that "it is the most important thing we have ever been given, and are ever likely to be given". [12]
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