We are blessed with so much ceramic activity in Ōtepoti/Dunedin this autumn!

 Nam Sook Chang, TransCultural Experience

Dunedin School of Art Lunchtime Seminar presents Korean Artist Nam Sook Chang, TransCultural Experience

Thursday May 7th 12-1pm. Dunedin School of Art, Lecture Room P152, 19 Riego Street, Dunedin

‘My work explores “TransCultural Experience,” reflecting my journey across identities, places and personal histories. At its core is a lingering question: What if I had stayed in New Zealand after graduating from the Dunedin School of Art 20 years ago?’

NamSook Chang was born in Seoul, Korea, and studied ceramics, completing both a BFA and MFA from Seoul National University of Technology in 1997. She moved to New Zealand in 2019 and lived there for five years, completing another MFA degree at the Dunedin School of Art in 2002. NamSook returned to Korea in 2003 and taught ceramics as an Adjunct Professor at SNUT and was a lecturer at Konkuk University and Seoul National University of Education, before moving to Germany in 2015, undertaking residencies and curating the Salon der Keramik. Returning to Korea in 2021, she established the Seoul Forest Ceramic Studio and has completed artist residencies at Jingdezhen University and Zibo Macsabal in China, and curated the Namwon International Ceramic Camp and coordinated the Macsabal International Ceramic Exhibition in Korea. 

Clay Hand Building Demonstration

Guided by Peter Hawkesby

Saturday 9 May | 11:00 AM – 12:00 PM

Try your hand and enjoy a view into artist Peter Hawkesby’s making process. Peter uses unique clay hand building techniques to create artworks, including his distinct Heart Basket works which form a prominent part of his Suite 2026 project Heart Basket & other work.

This is a relaxed demonstration to experience the artist at work, with no set outcomes. After the demonstration, attendees are invited to enjoy a cup of tea together, and you are invited to bring along your favourite mug to show and tell.

One of Aotearoa New Zealand’s most highly regarded ceramicists, Peter Hawkesby moved to Ōtepoti Dunedin in 2020. After many years of living and working in Tāmaki Makaurau Auckland, he arrived in the South with the assorted set of loose parts that accumulate over a lifetime of working with and thinking about clay.

All participants under the age of 14 must be accompanied by a parent or caregiver for the duration of the session.

FREE 11am Saturday 9 May
DPAG Classroom

Holding Space

Jess Nicholson / Lucy Hunter / Locke Jean-Luc Unhold / Mollie Schollum at Hutch Gallery, Dunedin

Holding Space brings together four local ceramicists whose distinct practices explore what it means to hold, and to be held, through clay. Across a vibrant range of techniques, surfaces, and forms, each artist approaches the vessel not only as an object, but as a gesture of care, presence, and connection… one that exists in a delicate tension between fragility and endurance.

From bold, expressive structures to more intimate, figurative and tactile works, the exhibition moves between containment and openness, strength and softness, stability and imbalance. This interplay introduces a quiet tension that runs through the works, where forms appear to stretch, press, or resist their own limits. These pieces hold more than material; they carry traces of touch, memory, and process, inviting viewers to consider both the visible and the latent tensions within and around them.

In this shared space, clay becomes a language for both individuality and dialogue. Each work offers its own interpretation of holding, whether physical, emotional, or symbolic whilst also negotiating the tension between autonomy and relation. Surfaces pull against structure, gestures hover between control and release, and each piece contributes to a collective rhythm of form, colour, and energy that feels both cohesive and unsettled.

Together, they create an environment that is at once dynamic and grounded, where making is an act of attention and where even the most solid forms seem to contain an internal tension… something quietly held, yet never entirely resolved.

Holding Space is an invitation to pause and to reflect on what we carry, what contains us, and how, through form, we navigate the tensions that shape our connections to ourselves and to one another.

Sticky Earth

Bertha Artspace is an exciting new gallery and workshop space in Port Chalmers.

Te Ahikāroa – Artists and Stories of Dunedin Public Art Gallery

Dunedin Public Art Gallery presents Te Ahikāroa featuring works from their collection until June 2027. They have also published a richly illustrated new book of the same name featuring over 200 works within the collections, including ceramics by Kate Fitzharris and Paul Maseyk. Kate’s work can also been seen in the exhibition alongside works by William de Morgan and the Martin Brothers.

‘Te Ahikāroa invites viewers on a journey through the collection of Dunedin Public Art Gallery, shaped by artworks and stories that have been gathered together since the collection was first exhibited in 1884. This exhibition celebrates art and artists, the many paths that have brought their work to Ōtepoti Dunedin, and the possibilities that emerge when art, ideas and people come together.

Ahikāroa describes the continuous occupation of land through whakapapa, acknowledging the home fires which marked settlements and those who have maintained these connections across generations. In this opening space of Te Ahikāroa, photography, sculpture, poetry and waiata acknowledge mana whenua. In the adjacent galleries, artworks spanning centuries, cultures and vast geographies reveal the breadth of the Dunedin Public Art Gallery collection and the stories that gather here. 

Te Ahikāroa celebrates Aotearoa New Zealand’s first public art collection, and its place and identity in Ōtepoti Dunedin. This is a collection and institution grounded by a belief in art to connect people and ideas, and open minds to different ways of thinking. The exhibition reflects the journey of the institution, using works from the collection to tell stories of arrivals and departures, new foundations and relationships, and the possibilities that exist just beyond the horizon.’ Dunedin Public Art Gallery

Kate Fitzharris, Looking at things as a whole #6, 2023. Photograph by Justin Spiers

Milford Galleries, Dunedin: The Lost Garden

Featuring ceramics by Aaron Scythe, until 18th May.