Misty spring sunrise, Kakahi, King Country. 2008-2010

oil on canvas

1200 x 2400 mm

$8,200

This was the first of these paintings to emerge. A special one for me because this is the view that Peter McIntyre had from his other painting studio. (I now work in his Wellington one). We stayed at Kakahi with Dad, Ruby and his friend Sara McIntyre, and it was our first trip away with him after his diagnosis.

The view is from the top of a river cliff, where the Whakapapa river, full of the snow melt from Ruapehu, and rain from it’s watershed, has carved its way into the ground, on its journey to the coast as the Whanganui.

The river now has taken the ground that the studio and house once stood on. In this foreground flies a fantail, light and darting above the river – with it’s heavy news to give. Over the hills the light catches the mist, and then the solitary Kahikatea, in the first of the sun.