Staff
Christina Barton, Manutaki | Director
+64 4 463 5254
christina.barton@vuw.ac.nz
Christina Barton (DLitt, MNZM) is Associate Professor and Director of Te Pātaka Toi Adam Art Gallery. She was appointed to this role in 2007 but has contributed to the Gallery’s history, since its establishment in 1999, from her position as a senior lecturer in Art History at Victoria University of Wellington (she joined the University in 1995). She is recognised as one of New Zealand’s leading art historians, curators, and writers, having previously worked at the Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa (1992-1994) and Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tāmaki (1987-1991). She has published extensively on New Zealand art and artists, as well as co-editing Antic magazine (1986–1990) and Reading Room, a journal of contemporary art and culture published by the E. H. McCormick Research Library at Auckland Art Gallery (2007–2018). Notable exhibitions since 2000 include: Joseph Kosuth: Guests and Foreigners, Rules and Meanings (Te Kore) (Adam Art Gallery 2000); Anthony McCall: Drawing with Light (Adam Art Gallery 2010); what is a life? kim pieters (Adam Art Gallery, 2014); Simon Denny: The Personal Effects of Kim Dotcom (Adam Art Gallery, 2014); Billy Apple®: The Artist Has to Live Like Everybody Else (Auckland Art Gallery, 2015); Bad Visual Systems: Ruth Buchanan, Judith Hopf, Marianne Wex (Adam Art Gallery, 2016); and Kate Newby: YES TOMORROW (Adam Art Gallery 2021). Christina Barton Staff Profile at Victoria University of Wellington.
Kate Lepper, Kaitaupua Kaupapa Tūmatawhānui | Public Programmes and Communications Coordinator
+64 4 886 5455 or 022 010 8248
kate.lepper@vuw.ac.nz
Kate holds a Master of Fine Art (Distinction) from the Slade School of Fine Art, London, and is a practising artist with a broad range of experience in art galleries and cultural institutions in Aotearoa and the UK. Kate joins Te Pātaka Toi Adam Art Gallery from Te Kōkī New Zealand School of Music, having previously worked for Ngā Taonga Sound & Vision, Sarjeant Gallery Te Whare o Rehua, and in London, for Somerset House, Chisenhale Gallery, The Showroom, Gasworks, and The White Building.
Sophie Thorn, Kaiwhakarākei | Curator Collections
+64 4 463 5504
sophie.thorn@vuw.ac.nz
Sophie holds a Master of Arts in Art History and Theory from the University of Canterbury and a Diploma in Law and Collections Management through the London Institute of Art Law. She studied Heritage Materials Science through the Physical Sciences department at Te Herenga Waka–Victoria University of Wellington and Metallurgy at the Chemical Institute of Technology in Prague, Czech Republic. She has held positions at the Canterbury Museum, Experience Wellington, and Te Manawa Museums Trust. She has been with Te Pātaka Toi Adam Art Gallery since 2014.
Andy Cummins, Kaitaupua Whakatū Whakaaturanga | Head Technician and Production Coordinator
+64 4 463 5011
andy.cummins@vuw.ac.nz
Andy Cummins has been responsible for the delivery of our exhibitions since 2010. He also assists with the presentation and care of the University Art Collection and has played an important role in establishing the Gallery’s podcast channel. He is an experienced exhibition technician and built his own sound studio where he makes music.
Ann Gale, Mata Ahupae | Gallery Administrator
+64 4 463 5229
ann.gale@vuw.ac.nz
Ann holds a BFA degree from the University of Montana and has a professional background in registration and archiving with previous work experience at Walker Art Center, Minneapolis as well as assisting several artists based in New York City. She has been living in Wellington since 2012.
Charles Broughton, Kaiāwhina | Gallery Attendant
Volunteers
Te Pātaka Toi Adam Art Gallery is supported by a team of dedicated volunteers, who assist with administration and hosting during events and exhibitions. We are extremely grateful to our volunteers for the valuable contribution they make to gallery operations.
Board & Trustees
Jennifer Windsor
Professor Jennifer Windsor is Pro Vice-Chancellor Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences and Faculty of Education at Victoria University of Wellington. She completed her undergraduate degree at Cumberland College of Health Sciences in Australia and completed her masters and PhD at Purdue University in the United States. She was a professor at the University of Minnesota from 1990-2014, and was Department Chair of Speech-Language-Hearing Sciences from 2002-2008. She led all aspects of undergraduate education as Associate Dean in the College of Liberal Arts from 2008 onwards. Her scholarship focuses on children’s language acquisition and disabilities, and she has written numerous research articles on factors influencing language development. Professor Windsor joined Victoria and took up her current position in January 2015.
Sandy Callister
Dr Sandy Callister has been an advisory board member and Art Collection trustee since 2010. She is a foundation member of Aotea Ora Community Trust – Aotea/Great Barrier Island’s first social enterprise trust. She established and runs the Aotea Ora Artist Residency programme. Sandy is currently undertaking a Law Masters at Auckland University focusing on human rights issues and our child poverty legislation in Aotearoa. Her work as a community activist with tamariki through the Painga Project in high deprivation communities in South Auckland has been the catalyst. From 2003 to 2017 Sandy was a founder director of PROVIDENCE GROUP, an ‘insights driven’ strategic consultancy business. She previously worked for TVNZ, Saatchi and Saatchi in New York, Unilever in London, and was Managing Director of Colmar Brunton in Wellington. She holds a BA from Victoria University; a PhD in History from the University of Auckland and has studied women and leadership at the Harvard Business School. Her book The Face of War: New Zealand’s Great War Photography was published by Auckland University Press in 2008.
Jenny Harper
Jenny is the former director of Christchurch Art Gallery, and founding Associate Professor, Art History, Victoria University of Wellington (1995-2005). Jenny Harper was instrumental in the establishment of Art History at Victoria University of Wellington and led the Adam Art Gallery project to its successful opening in 1999. Now retired from her leadership role at the Christchurch Art Gallery, she is offering independent consultancy services to the art museum profession and cultural sector. She is a long-standing patron of the Adam Art Gallery and one of its keenest advocates, who brings her experience, knowledge and fundraising skills to see the Gallery and the Art Collection through the next phases of their history.
Madeleine Setchell
Madeleine is a professional communications and marketing practitioner with 20 years’ experience in the public and private sector and is particularly focused on the link between the effective organisational strategy and brand.
Robin Skinner
Robin Skinner is Dean of Architecture and Design Faculty Office at Victoria University of Wellington.
Carey Young
Carey Young began her working career in an advertising production role in Wellington New Zealand. She travelled to London in 1998 to continue working in this field whilst supporting herself through an undergraduate Fine Art degree at Goldsmiths College, University of London. On return to New Zealand in 2001 she worked for ten years with Hamish McKay and his stable of artists. She has run her own Gallery, The Young, and worked for leading auction house Webb’s and brings her knowledge of art and artists and the collectors who support them to her role on the board and as a trustee.
Michael Moore-Jones
Michael Moore-Jones is the AAG advisory board’s student representative. He is currently completing a PhD in New Zealand Studies that re-examines the foundations of cultural nationalism in New Zealand seeking its international roots and linkages through a close study of key figures in cultural history. He holds a master’s degree in art history from the University of Oxford and an undergraduate degree in philosophy, politics and economics from Yale-NUS College.
Previous Adam Art Gallery Interns
2022
Louie Zalk-Neale
Louie holds a BFA from Whiti O Rehua School of Art, Massey University, Wellington, and their creative work in performance, drawing, and moving image has already gained exposure at venues in Dunedin, Auckland and Wellington. Louie is interested in honing their research skills and learning about devising and delivering exhibitions and events. They are keen to bring their interests in queer theory, performance art and fashion, and mātauranga Māori to bear in helping develop the Gallery’s programmes.
2020–21
Millie Riddell
Although the outbreak of COVID-19 forced Millie to cut short her time in London, where she was undertaking her MA in Art History at the Courtauld Institute, and the Adam Art Gallery had to delay the start of the internship due to the lockdowns, the pandemic did mean that we could enjoy working with her between September 2020 and February 2021. Millie worked on various tasks, helping with our public programmes and learning about the contents of the New Zealand Art Archive. She has since seen through the delivery of Crossings (a group show about intimacies and distances) as a valued co-curator. After February 2021, we were able to employ her as a part-time curatorial assistant.
2019
Nina Dyer
Nina’s focus during her time at the Gallery was on developing public programmes to accompany our exhibition programme. A highlight for her was the series of talks she organised to accompany On the Last Afternoon: Disrupted Ecologies and the Work of Joyce Campbell. She also worked with gallery director Christina Barton and Curator Collections Sophie Thorn on the ‘one-work’ exhibition ‘A way through’: Colin McCahon’s Gate III which toured to Te Uru Waitākere Contemporary Gallery in 2019 and CoCA Centre of Contemporary Art Toi Moroki in Christchurch in 2020. Nina was responsible for exploring McCahon’s strongly anti-nuclear views and the iconography he drew upon to convey them in his mural-scaled painting. Nina went on to a full-time curatorial role at The Depot in Devonport, Auckland.
2018
Lachlan Taylor
Lachlan was an intern for the Adam while he pursued his Masters degree in Art History at Victoria University of Wellington. While working at the Gallery he undertook research towards the first exhibition dedicated to the New Zealand works of British artist Christopher Perkins, who spent four important years working in New Zealand between 1929 and 1934. Lachlan contributed an essay for the publication that accompanied the exhibition Looking for a new country: Christopher Perkins in New Zealand. After receiving his MA and completing the Adam Art Gallery internship, Lachlan received a one-year position as Curatorial Assistant at Artspace Aotearoa, Auckland, he then worked at Michael Lett, Auckland before returning to Te Whanganui-a-Tara in 2021 to undertake a Masters in Creative Writing at the University’s International Institute of Modern Letters.