Helen Schamroth
Helen Schamroth is an artist, writer, arts consultant and curator. Helen’s recent exhibition history includes the ‘Tracing’, a solo exhibition shown at Northart and the Jewish Museum Melbourne in 2011. A year earlier, she exhibited at the 13th Trienniale of Tapestry, in Lodz, Poland. Prior to that, her work appeared in a survey exhibition at Northart in 2005.
Helen has participated in a number of international and national group exhibitions and had a residency at the University of New South Wales. Helen has also written about art, craft and design for many publications, both nationally and internationally. In 1999 she won two Montana book awards for ‘100 New Zealand Craft Artists’. She has served on the Arts Board of Creative New Zealand and produced arts strategiesfor Waitakere City, Whangarei District and Nelson-Tasman Region. In 2005 she was awarded ONZM for services to the arts.
Featured Artist
Shirley Cresswell
Full-time Hamilton artist Shirley Cresswell came to painting after an extensive career as a registered nurse. It was her passion for art that saw her accompany a friend to a night school class in acrylics six years ago. Shirley went on to develop her own style and technique, painting photo-realism, that has won her awards and success at various exhibitions.
Shirley specialises in New Zealand coastal scenes and lake reflections, working to capture all the variations of natural light and shade. Her satisfaction comes from recreating a scene that people might otherwise not have noticed. For the last three years Shirley has been selected to have a single artist wall (SAW) at the NZ Art Show in Wellington.
Her work is currently exhibited at Art Matakana, the Tairua Little Gallery of Fine Art, Gallery Artisan in Hamilton, the Monterey Gallery in Auckland and the NZ Academy of Fine Arts in Wellington.
Group exhibitions include the National Plunket Exhibition in Timaru and the National Art Exhibition and Sale in Napier.
Her awards include runner-up at the 2009 Great Waikato Art Show and merit awards at the 2008 and 2009 Great Summer Art Exhibitions at Snells Beach. In 2012 she won first place in the exhibition’s professional category.