Exhibition reveals Jenny Gillies' Secret Garden

Fresh from her highly acclaimed show at the Royal Adelaide Show, Jenny Gillies is showcasing her fascination for Christchurch’s ‘secret gardens’ in her costume exhibition at Our City O-Tautahi. Jenny Gillies’ Secret Garden – A fantasy of wearable flowers and fruit opens tomorrow at Our City O-Tautahi.

Jenny Gillies says: “You can walk for hours through the Garden City’s neighbourhoods and see the most wonderful things, but there’s always that sense of excitement and expectation – what is hidden beyond that wall or around that corner, what could I discover? That has become part of the magic of this latest exhibition’s theme.’’

The costumes are accompanied by extensive set designs by renowned set and props designer Julian Southgate, themed around a formal garden setting complete with trimmed hedges and garden walls.

The exhibition also features Jenny's subversive interpretation of Mr McGregor's Garden, the humour inherent in her oversized fruit costumes providing the antidote to Mr McGregor's immaculately tended rows of crops.

“Often it’s those ‘other’ little visitors to the garden, snails and white butterflies in particular, which thwart my best gardening efforts. They seem to share my enthusiasm for replacing the roses and the privet hedges with vegetables, but don’t require a plate to enjoy them. It does conjure up a sense of Peter Rabbit having visited,” says Jenny.

Jenny will also introduce her Christchurch audience to one of her best kept secrets at the exhibition – costumes from her first overseas tour to Christchurch’s sister city, Adelaide, Australia. Over 42,000 people attended her Wearable Blooms show over the 10 days of the Royal Adelaide Show 2009. Costumes included Australia’s national flower, the wattle, and the floral emblem of South Australia, Sturt's desert pea.

In preparing her secret garden costumes Jenny coordinated a photo-shoot of models wearing her costumes in the beautiful garden of Diana, Lady Isaac, images of which will be on display at the exhibition.

“There were the most wonderful meandering paths, an orchard and a potting shed, and the occasional rabbit. It was a case of what vignette is around the corner that we can use to frame and accentuate the costume.”