In this episode, I sit down with Emma Fitts at Melanie Roger Gallery in Tāmaki Makaurau.This episode is part of a series I’m delivering this season for the McCahon House Parehuia Residency, celebrating their 20th Anniversary, where I’m volunteering the services of The Good Oil to highlight the wonderful and important work they do, and some of their very impressive alumni, which includes Emma.Emma studied Fine Art at the University of Canterbury, before completing a Master of Fine Art at the Glasgow School of Art in Scotland.Her work is held in numerous public and private collections, including the Christchurch Art Gallery Te Puna o Waiwhetū, The Dowse Art Museum, the University of Canterbury Art Collection, and the Chartwell Collection at Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tāmaki. She has also been the recipient of several art prizes and residencies, including the Olivia Bower Residency, and of course is Alumni of the McCahon House Parehuia residency.Emma is represented by Melanie Roger Gallery in Auckland.There are images of the works that we talk about on The Good Oil Emma Fitts Instagram Post for your reference. In the episode, you’ll hear how she takes inspiration and direction from fashion and textiles, the potential of canvas beyond simply painting on it, the wealth of guidance she has taken from Anni Albers, how strong the research component of her practice is, and how that makes her in part an historian, and, I really liked this, she observes we’re living in a fluorescent time now with society not being so gentle, and how she plans to respond to that.

In this episode, I sit down with Richard Lewer at Suite Gallery in Tāmaki Makaurau.This episode is part of a series I’m delivering this season for the McCahon House Parehuia Residency, celebrating their 20th Anniversary, where I’m volunteering the services of The Good Oil to highlight the wonderful and important work they do, and some of their very impressive alumni, which includes Richard.Richard has a BFA from the Elam School of Fine Arts at the University of Auckland and and Master of Visual Arts from Victoria College of the Arts at the University of Melbourne. His work is held in numerous public and private collections, including Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tamaki, The Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongawera, the National Gallery of Australia, the National Gallery of Victoria, and the Art Gallery of New South Wales. He is also the recipient of several art prizes and residencies, including the 2026 Archibald Portrait Prize, and of course is Alumni of the McCahon House Parehuia residency.Richard is represented in Suite Gallery in Tāmaki Makaurau, Jan Murphy Gallery in Brisbane and Hugo Michell in Sydney.There are images of the works that we talk about on The Good Oil Richard Lewer Instagram Post for your reference. In the episode, you’ll hear Richard talk about how Colin McCahon text paintings spoke to him as a teenager, that he views his job as a painter is to document raw but beautiful, personal tender moments of human experience, how he’d love to be a funeral painter, the various substrates that he works with and how they excite him because of the different narrative they add to works, and why he describes painting as a bit like digging a hole.

In this episode, I visit Martin Basher at his studio in Te Whanganui-a-Tara.This episode is part of a series I’m delivering this season for the McCahon House Parehuia Residency, celebrating their 20th Anniversary, where I’m volunteering the services of The Good Oil to highlight the wonderful and important work they do, and some of their very impressive alumni, which includes Martin.Martin has a BFA and MFA, both from Columbia University in New York.His work is held in numerous public and private collections, including Chartwell Collection at Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tāmaki , The Agnes Gund Collection New York, the Majuda Collection also in New York, at the Pah Homestead Collection in Auckland. He has also been the recipient of several art prizes and residencies including the La Brea Residency in Los Angeles, the Susan Goodman Residency in Berlin, and, of course, the McCahon House Parehuia Residency in Tāmaki Makaurau. Martin is represented by Starkwhite Gallery in Auckland.There are images of the works that we talk about on The Good Oil Martin Basher Instagram Post for your reference. You’ll hear Martin the unlikely role that itinerant agricultural work took in developing his practice, his relationship to the act of painting itself, which has seen him try to hide his hand in different ways, while also admitting he needs the very act of painting in his life, the two literary figures that have helped shape the subject matter, the multifaceted role that cardboard plays and represents in the work, his ongoing environmental concerns, which are still driving a driving force for him.

In this episode, I visit Ed Bats at his home and studio.Ed’s art qualifications are a little different from most artists that appear on the podcast, having been largely educated within the graffiti art community in Cape Town and New Zealand, a self confessed “confusing degree” and the world of furniture making and design.At this point in an introduction I usually reel off a list of public collections that an artist is in. The inclusion of Ed in an episode is instead a little different - and this requires more editoralising than usually happens here. In Ed’s case I believe the proof points of what a strong practice his is, are his high degree of technical skill in making, combined with a strong awareness, appreciation and application of art history into his works. In part this is taking the baton of sorts from Don Driver, a figure from Aotearoa Art History I’m really excited to see paid homage to. All of that comes together, with his own ideas of course, to produce really compelling contemporary art practice. Likely some of the reasons he has been added to so many private collections in the last few years. The opinion you didn’t ask for ends there, promise.Ed is represented by Peg Gallery in Te Whanganui-a-Tara There are images of the works that we talk about on The Good Oil Ed Bats Instagram Post for your reference. You’ll hear Ed talk about how his graffiti and joinery practices influence and presents itself in his studio practice, how important music is as a studio assistant, the motifs in his work that he can’t seem to escape from and his colour choices in painting, which are often secondary to the creation of substrate he builds.

In this episode, I visit Neke Moa at her home and studio in Ōtaki on the Kāpiti CoastBy the way, this episode is part of a series I’m delivering this season for the McCahon House Parehuia Residency, celebrating their 20th Anniversary, where I’m volunteering the services of The Good Oil to highlight the wonderful and important work they do, and some of their very impressive alumni, which includes Neke.Neke is Te Whare Papaīra, Ngāti Kahungunu, Kāi Tahu, Ngāti Porou, Ngāti Tūwharetoa.She has several qualifications in arts and teaching, including Diploma of Design and Art, from Te Wānanga-ō-Rau-kawa.Her work is held in numerous public and private collections, including Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tāmaki, the Dowse Art Museum, and the Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa. She is also the recipient of several art prizes and residencies, including the McCahon House Parehuia residency.Neke is represented by Season Gallery in Tamaki Makaurau.There are images of the works that we talk about on The Good Oil Neke Moa Instagram Post for your reference. I’ve also included a list of some of the te reo Māori that is in the episode, just in case you’re not familiar with all those words.You’ll hear Neke explain that her practice is always a collaborative one, even when she is in the studio by herself, how and why her work is sometimes respected more overseas than it is in Aotearoa, the role of activism in the practice and works, how the historical pakeha definition of art and value systems devalued Maori practices and therefore excluded the preservation of some taonga, and how toi Māori is in a new evolutionary phase.

In this episode, I visit Graham Fletcher at his home and studio in Sawyers Bay, Otago.Graham has several qualifications to him name, including a Master of Fine Arts (with Hons) and a Doctor of Fine Arts, both from the Elam School of Fine Arts at the University of Auckland. He has shown in numerous solo and group shows for over 25 years, and his work is held in many private and public collections, including in the Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tamaki, The Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa, The Sarjeant Galley Te Whare o Rehua and the Dowse Art Museum, and has a long list of awards and residencies to his name.He is represented by Gow Langsford Gallery in Auckland and Milford Gallery in Ōtepote Dunedin.There are images of the paintings that we talk about on The Good Oil Graham Fletcher Instagram Post for your reference. You’ll hear Graham talk about how the combination of a visit to a home in Mt Eden and the Centre Pompidou in Paris, and architecture magazines have had an unexpected and huge impact in the eventual direction of his practice, the relationship between tribal works and contemporary paintings that appear as subjects in his work, the role of the surreal, perfect world of advertisements of the 1960’s as rich reference material and the main lesson that he has taken from Matisse.

In this episode, I visit Ruby Wilkinson at her studio in Tāmaki Makaurau.Ruby holds a Bachelor of Fine Arts from the Massey University College of Creative Arts, Te Whanganui-a-Tara, and is currently in the Master of Fine Arts program at Victoria College of Arts, Melbourne University.Her work is held in numerous public and private collections in Aotearoa, including in the Arts House Trust Collection, and she won the supreme winner of the New Zealand Painting and Printmaking Award in 2021, and has exhibited in over a dozen solo and group shows since 2020.She is represented by Jhana Millers Gallery in Wellington.There are images of the paintings that we talk about on The Good Oil Ruby Wilkinson Instagram Post for your reference.You’ll hear Ruby speak about the interesting role figuration has in her process of abstract painting, why she thinks the nature of a her intuitive painting practice is one that so readily translates to viewers, how her paintings can include a lot of private elements that viewers will never see, how she considers a single painting that we see, a layer of multiple paintings that she has created, and, as you’ll hear right throughout the episode, a theme of a young painter that is carefully guiding her evolution with a series of restrictions and deliberate lessons.

In this episode, I visit Grace Wright at her studio in Tāmaki Makaurau.Grace holds a Bachelor of Fine Arts and a Master of Fine Arts (with First Class Honours) from the Elam School of Fine Arts at the University of Auckland.She has several awards and residencies to her name, including being the recipient of the 2026 Toi Tauranga Art Gallery Patrons Project and the 2017 Parlour Projects Residency in Hastings. Her work is held in numerous private collections in Aotearoa and internationally, and has exhibited in over 20 solo or group shows.She is represented by Gow Langsford Gallery in Auckland and Ames Yavuz Gallery in Sydney, Singapore and London.There are images of the paintings that we talk about on The Good Oil Grace Wright Instagram Post for your reference. You’ll hear Grace speak about an experiment a few years into her practice which created an historical atmosphere that delivered a significant shift in the paintings, the constant wrestle she has with the paradox that exists in her practice, how reading broadly is an important experiential parallel to her painting, that she is drawing on a unique, unbiased mix including Baroque religious representation, mystics like Hilma af Klint and concepts held by quantum physics as a kind of collective awe of imperfect knowledge to explore painting.

In this episode, I visit John Ward Knox at his home, studio and garden in Karitane.John holds a Master of Fine Arts from the Elam School of Fine Arts at the University of Auckland.He has work held in numerous public and private collections, including the Chartwell collection, the Pah Homestead collection and the Govett-Brewster Gallery collection, he has exhibited in over 35 solo or group shows, and has been the recipient of several art awards and residencies, including being the The Francis Hodgkins Fellowship recipient in 2015.He is represented by Robert Heald Gallery in Te Whanganui-a-Tara, Ivan Anthony in Auckland and Darren Knight Gallery in Sydney / Gadigal land.There are images of the paintings that we talk about on The Good Oil John Ward Knox Instagram Post for your reference.You’ll hear John speak about the pace and footprint he wants for himself and the practice, the active role of writing as a parallel to works and exhibitions, a belief that his role as an artist is to create space for someone to exist, but also how viewers can implicate themselves in the duration, or destruction, of the objects that he creates, his relationship to rural, small town and big city Aotearoa, and how he managed to sustain eight years of painting from a single $38 tube of paint.

In this episode, I sit down with Ōtepoti based artist Simon Kaan at Sanderson gallery in Tāmaki Makaurau.Simon is of Ngāi Tahu, Chinese and Pākeha descent. He has a Diploma of Fine Arts, with Honours, from Otago Polytechnic, and has works held in numerous public and private collections including The University of Waikato collection, at The Arts House Trust and the Christchurch Art Gallery Te Puna o Waiwhetu collection. He has also been the recipient of several art awards and residencies. He is represented by Sanderson Gallery in Auckland, Gallery Thirty Three in Wanaka and De Nova gallery in Ōtepoti.There are images of the paintings that we talk about on The Good Oil Simon Kaan Instagram Post for your reference. In the episode you’ll hear Simon speak about the influences of his Chinese, Māori and European whakapapa on his life and practice, how the absence of a Western art aesthetic growing up made art school more challenging, but also allowed him to create his uniquely own work, the significant influence of Marilyn Webb, his encounters with Ralph Hotere and a kind of parallel of Ralph's painting that Simon sees in his own work, and his ongoing collaboration with ceramicist and uku maker, Wi Taepa