In his new sculpture project, artist Ammon Ngakuru (Ngāti Maniapoto, Te Roroa and Ngāpuhi, born 1993) explores the theatrical potential of the North Terrace at Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tāmaki. Reconsidered as an open-air stage, objects ‘perform’ for viewers observing from the nearby park and the Gallery interior. As we navigate through these object-props, we begin to produce these Three Scenes, 2025, tracing the artist’s thought patterns while mapping our own.
The artwork features four main sculptural objects: a pair of curtains; a miniature replica of the old flour store at Ngāruawāhia; a floral arrangement based on the Hoya carnosa flower; and an enlarged replica of a bar of Dove Soap carved in stone which supports three bronze flies. The curtains divide the terrace into front and backstage, suggestive of the spaces visible to a theatre-watching public.
Ngakuru reimagines the flour store as a bird feeder, inviting the park’s feathered neighbours on site. Its real-life equivalent is now a protected site and monument to industrial change in the Waikato, when Pākehā-run mills replaced smaller Māori-owned operations in the late 19th century. It is also the empty building of Ngakuru’s childhood neighbourhood, with ample scope for exploration. Behind the curtain, backstage, lies the soap.
Together, these objects form a network of personal and cultural association. Ngakuru’s art resists fixed definitions; instead, it hints at meanings through the interrelationships of objects. Three Scenes invites reflection on how we draw from our surroundings and how, in turn, we are shaped by them.
Supported by the Chartwell Trust and the Contemporary Benefactors of the Auckland Art Gallery.
Image credit: Ammon Ngakuru, concept drawing for Three Scenes, 2025. Commissioned by Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tāmaki, with support from the Chartwell Trust and the Contemporary Benefactors of the Auckland Art Gallery, 2025.
