Evans Bay Intermediate School Mural
John Drawbridge
Type
- Mural
Medium
- Paint
- Board
Dimensions
- 4 panels @ H2590 x W1370. Full dimensions: H2590 x W5500 x D5mm
John Drawbridge, ‘Evans Bay Intermediate School Mural’ (1965), Te Whanganui-a-Tara Wellington
Image: Bronwyn Holloway-Smith, Public Art Heritage Aotearoa New Zealand, 2024
- DETAILS
- MAP
Description
This mural was created for the foyer of the Evans Bay Intermediate School, which opened in 1964. It remains in its original location.
The acrylic painting is unusual within Drawbridge’s oeuvre as it was created during a phase when he was primarily producing highly abstracted works.
The composition features an underlying collage of shapes in a blue-grey tonal spectrum–possibly inspired by the school’s uniform colours–overlaid with abstracted renderings of a variety of features of Evans Bay and its surrounds including yachts, cargo ships, aeroplanes, rugby goal posts, and other built features relating to the aviation and marine environs.
Publicity for the mural, released at the time of commissioning, described it as being "in symbolic style rather than representation" and taking the viewer "on a round trip through Miramar Peninsula":
Beginning at bottom right we have Island Bay and hence through the heads and after a deviation to Wellington Airport, through Miramar Cutting to Miramar and Burnham Wharves. At middle top we are passing through Evans Bay with boat sheds and a small craft filling the left and centre of the mural. Finally at bottom centre is a representation of Kilbirnie Green, stronghold of Poneke Rugby Club. To right of hte mural is the Monowai ships' bell, presented to the school in 1965 by USS Co. Monowai had a distinguished war record as an armed merchant cruiser and troop carrier. She was employed often on convoy escort duties and in January 1942, had an encounter with a Japanese submarine outside Suva Harbour.
Source: Archives NZ, ID: R24738142
A preparatory collage for the mural is held by Archives NZ.
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