One of the artists who combined to establish Mahara Gallery in the mid-1990s, the late Robin Rogerson, is the subject of a tribute exhibition in the Gallery’s pop-up MAHARA iti, the last before the new gallery opens in July.
Robin Rogerson died last year. Apart from her role as a founder of Mahara, she left an impressive legacy of work held in private, public, corporate and diplomatic collections around the world.
Frequent travel during her lifetime, particularly during the early years of her marriage, influenced her work. She wrote: ‘I had the good fortune to live in Hong Kong and have two years tuition in Chinese painting … and held an exhibition of Chinese paintings during the time I lived in Damascus’.
Robin made hundreds of lively sketches while on the road that were later collated into a book, Travels with My Sketchbook.
‘Robin’s quickly observed sketches and paintings had a great fluidity, “looseness” and confidence of line which was perhaps born of her early training in Chinese brush painting in Hong Kong in the late 1960s,’ says MAHARA Director, Janet Bayly.
‘Besides a “good eye”, she also had a lovely subtle use of colour which she applied to fabric painting as well as her more formal paintings.
She led a rich and fruitful life as an artist which has brought pleasure to many of her supporters and buyers over the years.’
Janet Bayly says Robin Rogerson shared the dream of her fellow founding artists that MAHARA would one day be a purpose-built gallery on a scale able to do justice to its role as the district gallery for Kāpiti.
‘With that in mind, it’s fitting that we should devote our last show before the opening of the new MAHARA to an artist who has made such a contribution to the artistic life of Kāpiti.’ Robin spent her childhood in Kerikeri and Whangārei. After her travels in Asia and the Middle East, she studied watercolour painting in Wellington followed by three-years’ study in a variety of subjects and mediums at the Melbourne School of Art—among them the art of silk painting.
A long-time Reikorangi resident, Robin was a founding director and trustee of Mahara Gallery from 1995 to 2001, alongside fellow artist Fay Bresolin. She continued her commitment to the district gallery as a member of the trust board until 2012. She also maintained an active life as an exhibiting artist until 2020, often exhibiting with cousin and artist Mary Zohrab.
‘This MAHARA iti tribute exhibition offers an opportunity for her many friends and admirers to gather amongst her artworks for a final time,’ says Janet Bayly.
A limited number of copies of Travels with My Sketchbook, will be available for sale—proceeds all going towards future gallery programmes.
ROBIN ROGERSON: A tribute, MAHARA iti, 13 April–26 May, 2023. MAHARA iti closes on 26 May, as we prepare to open the redeveloped Toi MAHARA in a few months.