The Toi Tauranga Art Gallery has reopened its doors after a two-year closure, welcoming back artists, families, and community members to its completely renovated spaces. The gallery's grand reopening drew excited crowds of whānau (families), artists, kaumātua (elders), cousins, rangatahi (young people), and curious passersby, creating an atmosphere of genuine anticipation and collective celebration that had been building throughout the community.
The gallery underwent an extensive $9.65 million redevelopment as part of Tauranga's broader Te Manawataki o Te Papa civic transformation project. During the closure that began in 2023, the facility received major seismic strengthening, a complete interior redesign, and a new entrance facing Masonic Park. The architectural renovation was led by Warren and Mahoney Architects, with design contributions from Extended Whānau and creative inspiration from Tauranga Moana artist Maraea Timutimu.
The upgraded facility now features new gallery spaces, improved lighting and air circulation systems, a dedicated moving-image room, an object-based gallery, a café, an expanded retail area showcasing local artists, and a new creativity center specifically designed for tamariki (children) and young people. The gallery is positioned at the heart of the future civic precinct, serving as a central cultural hub for the community.
A striking public artwork by Maraea Timutimu covers the front of the building, created using whenua (earth/land) from Matapihi, near Mount Maunganui. The colors flow across the wall like a gentle tide, but Timutimu explains that her family's ancestral land is literally eroding into the sea, and this artwork will similarly crack and erode over time. The piece serves as more than just a representation of the land – it embodies the land itself in action, serving as a powerful reminder of environmental fragility and human responsibility.
Upon entering the gallery, visitors are immediately greeted by a carved amo (carved support post) by Meihana Te Tawakura from Tamapahore Wharenui. This taonga tūturu (authentic treasure) creates an arresting presence in the foyer, with intricate details cut using early steel chisels that demonstrate Te Tawakura's innovative approach within traditional carving practices. The carving carries its own sense of stillness and mana (spiritual power), providing a grounding presence for the entire building.
Directly adjacent to the historical carving, Kereama Taepa's exhibition "Whakairo" creates an immediate connection between traditional and digital art forms. His work explores the concept of iro – the maggot that eats through timber – reimagined in digital form as it travels across the gallery walls. Visitors use iPads to activate the installation and follow the digital iro as it crawls through corners and over surfaces, with children pointing excitedly while adults try to keep pace and strangers become momentary collaborators in the experience.
The ground floor of the three-story gallery maintains a playful, cross-generational energy throughout. Tania and Tawhai Rickard's collaborative work is scattered throughout the space, creating an experience reminiscent of an Easter egg hunt. Visitors regularly bend down or lean into corners to open small doors and discover miniature worlds hidden inside, often calling others over to share their discoveries in a game-like atmosphere.
The tone shifts to more intimate territory with "Essential Oils," a collaborative exhibition by indigenous artists Tyrone Te Waa from Aotearoa (New Zealand) and Matthew Harris from Australia. Their works weave a dialogue across the Tasman Sea, exploring themes of place, ancestry, and spiritual undercurrents through various materials, scents, and forms. The room's atmosphere naturally encourages visitors to slow down and reflect more deeply.
Around the corner, a video work by Kaylene Whiskey holds its own gravitational pull, marking her first exhibition in Aotearoa. The piece seamlessly blends pop culture joy with Anangu iconography, showing Whiskey moving through bright costumes and catchy music while maintaining the steady presence of strong women from her community.
The second floor creates a more reflective atmosphere, featuring an exhibition by mother-and-daughter team Pusi and Vaimaila Urale. Their works incorporate paint, wood, and fabric, moving fluidly between Samoa and Aotearoa, between past and present, and between inherited cultural patterns and new artistic interpretations. The exhibition feels like witnessing a conversation held across decades between generations.
Nearby, the "Glimmer" exhibition features jewelry and object works by Vanessa Arthur, Moniek Schrijer, and Meredith Turnbull, inviting visitors to engage in closer, more intimate forms of attention. People lean directly up to the works to study intricate textures and shapes, demonstrating that art need not be large-scale to carry significant presence and impact.
The final exhibition space belongs to Darcy Nicholas's retrospective, which feels like taking a deep breath upon entering. His paintings, carvings, and drawings span multiple decades and hold a quiet authority that grounds the entire gallery experience, offering visitors a sense of artistic completeness and historical continuity.
Throughout the opening celebration, the strongest underlying theme was connection – to the land through Timutimu's work, across time through the pairing of Te Tawakura and Taepa's pieces, across oceans in the artistic dialogue between Te Waa and Harris, through humor and joy in Whiskey's video installation, through family lineage with the Urales' exhibition, and through artistic legacy in Nicholas's comprehensive retrospective.
Gallery Director Sonya Korohina emphasized that the temporary closure provided a valuable opportunity for reflection and reimagining. "It gave us a chance to ask what an art gallery today, and into the future, needs to be for its community," she explained. "This project was about giving our community a place they feel belongs to them, a place that reflects Tauranga back to itself." Since reopening, the gallery has fulfilled its intended purpose of welcoming the people of Tauranga to reflect on themselves, their land, and their connections to one another.
