Caroline McQuarrie, Like the Turf: Forrester Gallery, Ōamaru
Like the Turf reveals Caroline McQuarrie’s artistic exploration of Pākehā histories of colonial settlement through the examination of a specific set of immigrants in late 19th century Aotearoa New Zealand. Skilled migrants and their families left Cornwall and Southwest Devon’s failing tin mines to join the New Zealand gold rushes or work in underground gold and coal mines. Locations in Aotearoa the miners landed stretched from Kawau Island in the Hauraki Gulf through the Coromandel, the West Coast and into Otago. Conceptually this exhibition examines intergenerational histories and sociologies. Combining photographic imagery, embroidery and textiles to contextualise the lives of these colonial-settlers, Like the Turf weaves the less visible experience of women and families with the legacy of industry left in the landscape. The imagery in Like the Turf has been made on the whenua of Ngāti Waewae, Kāti Māhaki ki Makaawhio and Kāti Huirapa ki Puketeraki (Ngāi Tahu), Ngāti Hauā (Waikato Tainui) and Ngāti Manuhiri.
