Tauranga’s Art Gallery will reopen in November after closing two years ago for a major revamp.
Toi Tauranga Art Gallery sits in the city’s future civic precinct, Te Manawataki o Te Papa.
The $306m precinct will include a library and community hub, civic whare (public meeting house), exhibition gallery and museum.
Tauranga Art Gallery will open to the public on November 15.
Tauranga Art Gallery Trust, external community trust grants and Tauranga City Council jointly funded the $9.65m gallery redevelopment.
Funding included $1.150m from TECT, Pub Charity and Tauranga Art Gallery Foundation external grants and a Tauranga Art Gallery Trust contribution of $3.274m.
Tauranga Art Gallery Trust chair Rosemary Protheroe said the revamp had come from two different directions.
“When the council announced Te Manawataki o Te Papa, we [Gallery Trust] sat back on our haunches and thought, ‘wow, this is a fantastic opportunity for us’.”
Protheroe told the Bay of Plenty Times the gallery had to reorient to align with the new precinct.
“We needed to be taking our position as part of the larger precinct, and in doing that, it opened other opportunities to look at what the public was asking from us.”
Tauranga would have a “state-of-the-art facility”.
“We have achieved a fantastic space that is future-proofed and vibrant, it’s for generations to come.”
The gallery team continued work offsite during the closure, creating a pop-up gallery in central Tauranga, running children’s art workshops and continuing ongoing artist engagement.
Seismic strengthening, lighting and air-conditioning systems were upgraded bringing the gallery up to international museum standards. Photo / Supplied
The gallery will reopen with nine exhibits by artists from across New Zealand, Australia and the Pacific.
Its reopening line-up includes exhibitions and collaborations showcasing portraiture, textile art, jewellery, video work and augmented reality (AR) art experiences.
Gallery visitors can experience Kereama Taepa’s Whakairo – an augmented reality art experience.
Taepa said it had felt “like an age” since the gallery journey had begun.
“I’m so excited to finally share the work with everyone and unleash it into the world.”
He said origins and starting points were a theme running through the installation, and he was grateful to be able to create for the new gallery space.
“My very first exhibited AR artwork was also here at the gallery, back in 2012, so it feels like a full circle thing too.”
Other work includes portrait favourites Old Friends by Samoan mother and daughter, Pusi and Vaimaila Urale, from the Tauranga Art Gallery collections and, showing for the first time in Tauranga, work by senior artist Darcy Nicholas.
Nicholas’ exhibition draws together a curated selection of drawings, paintings, jewellery and carvings spanning nearly six decades of practice.
Toi Tauranga Art Gallery director Sonya Korohina said the biggest challenge was being closed for two years.
“We’ve been a part of the community for 16 years and are the creative fabric for our local artists, so being closed has been difficult to not have that connection.”
She said an art gallery in the city centre would give a “sense of place”.
“Having a cultural institution that you can engage with through art as a portal is a way for our community to build that sense of place, identity and understand different perspectives.”
Korohina told the Bay of Plenty Times the gallery represented artists not only from the Bay of Plenty, but also nationally and internationally.
“With contemporary artists, art enables us to understand and see different perspectives, and see the world differently, more than just through our phones.
“We live in such a global world right now that often we’re not anchored, and that’s what art really can do.”
The gallery will open to the public with a free community celebration on Saturday, November 15, from 10am to 4pm.
Kaitlyn Morrell is a multimedia journalist for the Bay of Plenty Times and Rotorua Daily Post. She has lived in the region for several years and studied journalism at Massey University.
6 comments
Hmmm
Posted on 04-09-2025 08:45 | By Let's get real
Closed for two years you say... Who knew..?
Presumably all staff were made redundant to save ratepayers funds. After all, their workplace was closed.
9 million
Posted on 04-09-2025 12:19 | By Kancho
How nine million drops off the tongue that was once a mind boggling amount almost beyond comprehension . Still in terms of current spending by TCC and the debt it is a wonderful spin. The earth was formed in a collision about 4.6 million years ago so it scale of our debt that would put the amounts spoken of . I find art galleries now are aften now challenge and provoke. I have been to internationally famous amazing galleries and amazing skilled art but my last visit in Sydney cured me. I hope our local gallery will revue well but unlikely I will see where some of my rates have gone. Besides town that I once enjoyed shopping and hospitality restaurants etc no longer attracts me and become difficult
Oops
Posted on 04-09-2025 15:00 | By Kancho
The earth is about 4.6 Billion years old ....so TCC debt tracking to a billion ? Hard to know figures are difficult to find with the spin smoke and mirrors
Nostradamus
Posted on 04-09-2025 16:14 | By You Must be Joking !
Notwithstanding that the TECT Community Trust has already donated $21 million of Beneficiary money to ensure that the unpopular $306 million Civic Precinct Revitalisation Project went ahead, they have found another $1 million or so on the two year project to paint and paper the old BNZ Building, aka the Art Gallery
It is presumed that the Staff of HOBEC will be encouraged to visit the Gallery during Lunch Breaks, given that they wont have to travel from 11th Av after the Business relocates to the Northern Quarter of the CBD. Great planning and forward thinking Bill
Roll up, roll up
Posted on 04-09-2025 19:36 | By nerak
ratepayers, come see what we have spent YOUR money on, and will continue to spend on it in the years ahead as it will need propping up. Gosh, it was closed for two years? Missed that, obviously a lot of other people kept on living with it closed.
Korohina reckons art can really anchor you? Nothing like struggling to pay rates can do that, believe me.
I note that 'artists' are into buzz words, just like anyone with TCC. Feel good and fluffy stuff doesn't put food on the table.
I'm a fan for Art.
Posted on 29-09-2025 15:55 | By morepork
I know you all think it is a waste of money (and, without checks and balances it certainly can be...) but if you've ever been moved by poetry, or literature, or music, painting, or sculture, you reach for that experience again.
Nerak says: "Feel good and fluffy stuff doesn't put food on the table." She's right. But it would be a poor existence if ALL we did was put food on the table...
“We have achieved a fantastic space that is future-proofed and vibrant, it’s for generations to come.”
OK, but they didn't ask for it, and they may not appreciate being saddled with the ongoing costs.
I just wish somebody, somewhere, in our administration, would do something for those of us here right now.
Showing some respect for our money would be a good start.
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