Joanna Margaret Paul (1945-2003) was a significant artist whose reputation, since her untimely passing, has gained more traction with recent major public gallery exhibitions and publications.
The Mahara Gallery in Waikanae is currently showing ‘Daily Kāpiti’, a collection of Paul’s paintings and drawings that were made on the coast from Pukerua Bay to Waikanae. This exhibition brings together a side of this artist’s work that previously has been overlooked and now is shown as a cohesive body of work for the first time. As Joanna was a dedicated artist, the title refers to her daily discipline and diary like way of making art, how it reflected her everyday life and places she visited.
As we all know, artists have long been attracted to the Kapiti coast for the quality of life and beauty of the environment. Joanna tended to move around, her journeys formed the daily diary of her life’s work and Kāpiti was a place she often returned to, drawn back to Paekākāriki where she produced, in 1977, a group of gouache paintings. Five of these have been reassembled for the exhibition.
I think the joyful colours of these works reflect enjoyment of her stay here and Paekākāriki people will share this pleasure in the work. In 1999 she showed at Paekākāriki’s One Eye Gallery, with a mixture of different work that included a series of drawings that pertains to Paekākāriki and Pukerua Bay specifically.
There are drawings of the Paekākāriki Hill and the Railway Station, as well as other scenes from the town and district that locals will identify with.
Many visitors to the exhibition have been praising the show so take the opportunity to see it over the summer. The exhibition runs at the Mahara Gallery from 21 November 2025 to 21 March 2026.
