Stories

It all began on 30 June, 1953. At the Playhouse Theatre on Auckland’s Karangahape Road, Danish dancer Poul Gnatt, the founding father of ballet in New Zealand, assembled a small group of young dancers to present two evenings of short ballets and excerpts from the classics. 70 years and more than 300 national, regional and international tours later, the Royal New Zealand Ballet will celebrate its platinum anniversary with a special programme, Lightscapes. The programme premieres in Wellington on 27 July and will be at the Isaac Theatre Royal in August. Lightscapes includes the world premiere of a work created specially for this moment, Te Ao Mārama, by Moss Te Ururangi Patterson. Inspired by haka and powered by the strength of the men of the company, this striking new ballet will be a lasting addition to the RNZB’s repertoire. Serenade (1934) was staged for the then-New Zealand Ballet by former Artistic...

For Hōhua Ropate Kurene, one of three artists chosen by Te Matatiki Toi Ora The Arts Centre for its winter Creative Residency programme, his home for the next three months is something of a mystery. That’s despite growing up in Ōtautahi Christchurch. “It was a rebuild project when I was in high school,” says the artist, who specialises in photography, creative writing and multimedia design. Hōhua Kurene’s experience is a reminder of the interruption that the earthquakes brought to life at Te Matatiki Toi Ora. A reminder also though of the potential realised by the rebuild. The Creative Residence was installed upstairs in the West Lecture building during post-quake restoration and strengthening. The residence has four ensuite bedrooms, shared facilities and rooftop views. The two artists who will join Hōhua Kurene are musician Lisa Tui Jonathan and visual artist Megan Brady. Lisa Tui has a background in singing, songwriting and musical theatre,...

Fergus Grady is in his third year as director of the French Film Festival Aotearoa and he still can’t quite believe the silver lining to his COVID cloud. With the programme in place for this year’s festival, which begins in Christchurch on Thursday 25 May, Fergus has flitted off to the Cannes Film Festival to start the process of curating next year’s programme. Don’t worry, he’ll be back for opening night. The French Film Festival Aotearoa 2023 features 23 of the best films to come out of France in the past year. Festival films will screen at the Academy Gold, Deluxe and Lumière cinemas. The festival runs from Thursday 25 May to Sunday 11 June. Until 2021 the French Film Festival Aotearoa was organised by Alliance Française, an international organisation that aims to promote the French language and francophone culture around the world. Come the uncertainty of COVID, Fergus and his film distribution company, Limelight,...

For some of us it’s just called putting on our uglies or sloppies. For the world’s trendspotters, though, it’s called slobwear and it’s here in 2023. Apparently. The 1980s are back too, with shoulder pads and leg warmers. And look out for “folklore grandma”, sleaze on everything and ‘90s minimalism. Art, science and marketing all feed into our fashion trends. Often the genius of the forecaster is giving a new trend a snappy, memorable name. Who can forget the “Frazzled Englishwoman” mini-trend of artfully undone hair, cardigans, minimal make-up and a big reliance on scarves? So according to a panel of style gurus surveyed by Vice, we can look forward to the folklore grandma trend (“modest, motherly and cosy with heavy layers, house slippers and knits”), feel-good “dopamine dressing” giving way to a darker, dystopian “anti-dopamine” trend, and the rise of “2000s normcore”, a trend to look and dress like “normal...

Christchurch cinephiles will be the first in the country to sample this year’s French Film Festival Aotearoa. The annual event will this year feature 23 of the best films to come out of France in the past year. With a varied menu of drama, comedy, thrillers, romance and true stories, there’s something for everyone. Festival films will screen at the Academy Gold, Deluxe and Lumière cinemas. The festival runs from Thursday 25 May to Sunday 11 June. Highlights of this year’s programme include the sexy and oh-so-French Masquerade, directed by Nicolas Bedos and starring the ageless Isabelle Adjani; Éric Besnard’s bucolic buddy movie A Great Friend; Sugar and Stars, which tells the true story of champion pastry chef Yazid Ichemrahem; demi-sec romcom The Tasting;  and laugh-out-loud heist spoof The Innocent. Pick up or download your festival programme and start booking if you don’t want to miss out. frenchfilmfestival.co.nz

One of Christchurch Art Gallery’s best-loved paintings, Petrus van der Velden’s 1872 work Burial in the Winter on the Island of Marken, also known as The Dutch Funeral, features alongside works by Aotearoa artists Rita Angus, Ralph Hotere, Colin McCahon, Séraphine Pick, Shane Cotton and Bill Hammond in the gallery’s new exhibition, Absence. Running from Saturday 6 May to Sunday 20 August, Absence brings together works from artists using diverse mediums and from different eras. All connect with the exhibition’s central theme – that sometimes the most compelling thing is what isn’t there. From the mournful, the mischievous, the monumental and the hardly-there-at-all, Absence invites viewers to fill in the gaps. “Artists have always been fascinated by the power of people and things not shown,” says Lead Curator Felicity Milburn. “In art, absence creates mystery, tension and anticipation – it can imply loss, transformation, exclusion, isolation and much more. It’s the...

With the Royal New Zealand Ballet bringing its dance adaptation back to the city, we take a look at cinema’s various treatments of Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet.  1. Warm Bodies (2013) Those steeped in Shakespeare and zombie movies will get more of the jokes but there’s plenty in this zom-rom-com for anyone to enjoy. The fight this time is between zombies and humans rather than Capulets and Montagues. Our unlikely couple are a zombie named R (Nicolas Hoult) and a living, breathing Julie (Theresa Palmer). And waddya know, love cures everything, even the lack of a pulse. 2. Romeo + Juliet (1996) Baz Luhrmann’s 1996 interpretation replaces swords with guns and sets the title characters in Verona Beach, California. Luhrmann’s trademark visual assault owes more to Mad Max than The Globe Theatre but hey, it’s a helluva ride! 3. Shakespeare in Love (1998) Again, you will get more of the jokes...

We’re a bit over NZ Music Month. Great initiative 20 years ago but surely we have moved on from just one month for Kiwi music. Like Valentine’s Day should be every day, every month should be NZ Music Month. There’s no harm though in shining a spotlight on our homegrown musos. Which is why we have put together our top 5 interviews with Kiwi artists from the past year. Stay tuned to our website for more – we talk to Kiwi musicians all year round!  Two into one makes DUAL We talk dreams and reality with Maurice Miller and Jamie Pyne, AKA Auckland-based psych indie dance duo DUAL. They slayed the Electric Avenue audience, have a second EP out and now have Australia in their sights. They’re definitely coming back to Christchurch at some stage – “It was fun, the whole city was going off,” says Maurice. Read the full Q&A...

A lot of fun all in a good cause – that’s the vibe captured in photographer Anupam Singh’s shoot for this year’s Breast Cancer Cure NZ winter collection of Tees For A Cure. In a first, this year’s BCC campaign has long-sleeve tees, crew-neck sweatshirts, hoodies and a tech jacket, all perfect for the cooler months. Designers on board include Coop, Juliette Hogan, Kathryn Wilson, Moochi, Nyne, Stella+Gemma, Storm, Trelise Cooper and Tuesday Label. For the photo shoot, Anupam gathered up fashion designers, breast cancer survivors and athletes. NZ women's rugby players Ruahei Demant, Maiakawanakaulani Roos and Liana Mikaele-Tu'u joined radio host Sean Hill, chef Peta Mathias, BCC board chair Fay Sowerby, Nerida Cortese and designer Juliette Hogan to showcase their favourite designs. Breast cancer kills two Kiwi women every day and 3500 are diagnosed each year. All profits from the campaign go to Breast Cancer Cure NZ so your purchases...

The battle is back on for the nation’s top toasted sandwich and this year’s Great New Zealand Toastie Takeover has a record number of entrants. There’s more than a baker’s dozen of Christchurch entrants alone, with sandwich names ranging from bad puns (eg. The Meaty’Oaker) to the frankly unpublishable. The annual competition keeps growing, with 185 eateries participating for 2023. Toastie fans now have three months to sample the contestants’ wares as they battle it out between now and late June. Open to all New Zealand eateries, this year’s participants range from sandwich specialists to fine dining restaurants, breweries and food trucks. Competition rules remain the same as previous years. Each toastie must be sandwiched between two slices of bread and be able to be eaten by hand if necessary. The toasted sandwich must contain cheese (or an acceptable vegan substitute) and pickles from the McClure’s Pickles range. Everything else is...

For Matt and Lauren Barus, it’s been a long journey from The Dukes and LA Mitchell. Through the noughties, both acts were stalwarts of the music festival scene, The Dukes getting the punters up and dancing, jazz singer and pianist LA Mitchell chilling them out later. Their meeting is a rom-com script – guitarist Matt and the rest of The Dukes were supporting INXS on the Australian band’s 2007 tour when he broke a wrist on Porters skifield. “Someone said there’s this singer and keyboardist that can cover your guitar lines. That was Lauren. She jumped on board for the tour and then she stayed.” The husband-and-wife duo now have two charming girls, Serafina and Mila. No terrible sons. The name they have given to their musical partnership comes from Matt and his musician brother, Jo, another Duke. They joke sometimes that their parents must be very disappointed by their terrible...

In the Open Christchurch programme, a celebration of the city’s exceptional works of architecture, 52 buildings put out the welcome mat to the public. This year the event coincides with a major survey of the city’s post-quake rebuild. It’s a mixed review. Of the 52 buildings in May’s Open Christchurch programme, there are grand reminders of Victorian splendour, looming modernist structures and such post-quake confections as Tūranga and Te Aratai College. For Dr Jessica Halliday, though, it’s the modest Dorset Street Flats that capture best the intent of the programme, which is to prompt a conversation about what good design is and why it is important. In doing so, we can learn from the past about how we can build for the future. The Dorset Street Flats are an excellent example. Designed in 1966 by a then young Miles Warren, the dwellings solved the problem he had at the time of...

Muso and food entrepreneur Flip Grater is on a mission to popularise plant-based goodies so you can have your pleasures without having to compromise your principles. She calls it ethical hedonism. You probably first popped up on many people's radar as a musician. Tell us about that part of your life? Yeah I worked in the music industry for many years, touring and recording. It was a great lifestyle and creative outlet. But after my daughter Anais was born I just felt like I needed to do more for the planet than singing sad songs!  Do you still find time for performing? I haven't played in public for a while but Anais and I play and sing around the house and I still love making music. I will always write and play because it's who I am. I'm just not doing it professionally at this moment in time.  How did you get...

Now that progress on the new Court Theatre site is clear for all to see, attention is swinging to the last big fundraising push. About $10.8 million of The Court Theatre’s $12 million fundraising target is now secure. To close the gap, The Court is asking supporters to ‘Take YOUR Seat’ in the new main auditorium, a 375-seat playhouse theatre at the heart of the new three-storey building, which will also have a 130-seat theatre, an education studio and several multipurpose spaces. In return for a donation of $1500 (per seat, tax-deductible), a personalised bespoke plaque with your inscription will be affixed to your Court Theatre seats for 10 years. This can by family name, in memorial of someone special or pseudonym – whatever appeals. The TAKE YOUR SEAT campaign will be launched at a function at Tūranga, overlooking the new theatre build, on Friday 28 April. If all 375 seats...

After slaying them at Electric Avenue, Auckland-based psych indie dance duo DUAL have a second EP out and now have Australia in their sights. Cityscape talks dreams and reality with Maurice Miller and Jamie Pyne. Let’s start with your name. DUAL suggests two elements combining to become something even greater. Jamie: Spot on. The name reflects the yin and yang of musical tastes and influences that we both have. When we are writing songs, we bring ideas along and work on them together. You know when it’s working. It’s always about the song. When you start writing a song, it already knows what it wants to be. Is that process a reflection of your long-time relationship? Maurice: That’s a big part of it. We’ve written a lot of songs so you get to know when you’re not feeling it and it’s time to move on. Jamie: It’s about finding the spark...

Feel in need of a spiritual recharge? Get along to the Body Mind Spirit Holistic Health Expo this weekend at Pioneer Stadium and you will find myriad ways and means of doing just that. The extensive array of exhibitors and workshops covers everything from exercise and fitness to clairvoyants, mediums and healing. Whether you’re seeking info, inspo, inner peace, mental stimulation or you’re just curious about what’s out there, the Body Mind Spirit Holistic Health Expo invites you to revitalise your body, stimulate your mind and pamper your soul. Sunjar, the driving force behind the expo, hopes it will inspire people to make positive, healthy and holistic changes in their lives. “Your health is your greatest asset,” he says. “We are responsible for our health and wellbeing as we head into the future. Open their minds and open their hearts to new holistic possibilities to enjoy life. Everything is evolving and change...

Time to ditch the jandals and get your feet into some walking shoes again – it’s the return of the Walking Festival! Coordinated by the Christchurch City Council in partnership with 30 host groups, the festival offers over 55 walks across Ōtautahi, Selwyn and Waimakariri from Saturday 8 April to Sunday 23 April. Want to explore our emerging cityscape? The Urban Play Walk is for you. New Brighton’s dunescapes more to your liking? Love Your Dunes is the one for you. There’s a walk celebrating Christchurch’s links with Antarctica, walks specially designed for kids and family groups, hard hikes, easy strolls and foraging wanders. Fur babies get to join in the fun on a dogs’ day out in the Red Zone. So whether you’re a fan of local history, of getting out into nature, socialising or pushing yourself to get that awesome view, there’s something for all ages and abilities. Walking...

Nic ‘Sailor Girl’ Douglass has over 60,000 followers on social media of her postings as a world champion sailor and inveterate adventurer. Today’s mission? Shepherding local media around the SailGP base in Lyttelton. In truth, Cityscape is more interested in the party on land than the racing on the water. “Have you had a chance to check out the city’s hospo offerings yet,” we ask. “No,” Nic says with an ‘I wish’ look. “My life is runways, freeways and slipways at the moment.” Looking around, it’s easy to see why. The SailGP circus doesn’t just arrive somewhere, it invades. In the nicest possible way, of course. From the last stop, in Sydney a month ago, 84 containers of boats, gear, sophisticated computer wizardry, even whole buildings, were shipped to Lyttelton, assembled and made ready for the heaving mass of punters that poured into the former gravel pit at Naval Point for...