Christchurch Art Gallery invites visitors to discover its outer spaces

Christchurch Art Gallery will this week begin offering free guided tours of works of art that features in its vicinity.

The Gallery will launch its Outer Spaces Tours initiative on Saturday 5 November. Tours will take place at 12 noon on weekend days until early next year.

Led by the Gallery’s volunteer guides, the 45 minute tours will explore a selection of works outside and near the Gallery. The tours will include Jae Hoon Lee’s Annapurna billboard on the Gallery’s Worcester Boulevard exterior wall and Julia Morison’s Aibohphobia, which has been installed on the car park bunker facing the Gallery’s glass façade.

Other works include a newly installed work on the Gallery’s forecourt titled You Are Here by local artist Matt Akehurst and a new light box project on the forecourt called Reconstruction: conversations on a city. This features cityscape paintings from the Gallery’s collection by Olivia Spencer Bower and Louise Henderson, which reflect on architectural heritage and loss and the rebuilding of our city. The Gallery’s gateway sculpture Reasons for Voyaging by Graeme Bennett and Fayne Robinson’s powhenua Te Pou Herenga Waka, outside the Worcester Boulevard entrance of Christchurch City Council’s Civic Offices will also feature on the tours.

Julia Morison Aibohphobia 2011. Acrylic paint. Reproduced courtesy of the artist.

Acting Director Blair Jackson says the tours are part of the ‘Gallery without walls’ initiative, which aims to ensure art and art-related programmes are available to the people of Christchurch while the Gallery’s doors are closed.

“Our new Outer Spaces tours are a great way for people to reconnect with our site and enjoy some of the wonderful art still on offer in our city, ” he says.

Artist Julia Morison will begin the tour on Saturday 5 November to discuss her work Aibohphobia and the Gallery plans to involve other artists as guest speakers on a monthly basis. Artist Matt Akehurst will speak about his work as part of the tour on Saturday 10 December.
Families will be able to pick up a free fun trail from the Gallery Shop (which is open for business seven days a week) and take themselves on a self-guided tour of the Outer Spaces works around the Gallery with fun questions and activities for the kids.

Outer Spaces tours at Christchurch Art Gallery

Saturdays and Sundays at 12 noon

Saturday 5 November 2011 to Sunday 19 February 2012 (excluding 24, 25, 31 December and 1 January)

Meet on the forecourt by the Outer Spaces sign.

No booking required.

This is an outdoor event so automatic cancellation applies on wet days.