Latest news with #Timaru-born
Otago Daily Times
22-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Otago Daily Times
For young DJ sets are just the bassline
To celebrate New Zealand Music Month, The Courier has caught up with some of South Canterbury's musical maestros to talk about their journeys and experiences with music. In this week's edition reporter Connor Haley talks with 22-year-old Timaru-born drum and bass DJ Quinn "Procy" Proctor. Where did your inspiration for getting into the drum and bass scene and DJing come from? It came mostly from going to parties. I'd always try and play my selection of music through the speaker and that turned into me wanting to make my own mixes. I downloaded an app on my phone and you could just upload two songs on it and it had all the controls that a DJ mixer would have. In September 2020 I asked my mum and dad if they could get me my own pair of decks for my birthday, which they did, and that's when I actually properly started mixing. I started doing mixes with my friends at parties and people started to take videos of it, so I started taking my own and thought 'why don't I post them on TikTok'. I never had any intention of doing anything seriously but then one blew up really big and got 1.5 million views. That sort of gave me the inspiration to just keep posting and from that I got my first booking in May 2021. How did you find going from recording yourself in your room to playing in front of live crowds? When I got booked for my first gig I made the jump from my $200 controllers straight to playing on thousands of dollars of equipment. I was thrown straight into the deep end. It was nerve-racking. I was so excited the weeks leading up to my first gig but when it came to the days before the nerves really kicked in. I couldn't work properly, I couldn't eat and I was just shaking. I remember thinking 'I do want to do this but I don't know if it's something I'll be able to do'. It's one of those things that has come with time, nowadays there's no worries at all, most of the time. What are some of the highlight gigs that stand out to you? Definitely all of the Castle St sets in Dunedin. There is a big university drum and bass culture there and I've been lucky enough to have been invited four or five times to play out to thousands of people there. They also stick out because whenever I'm there I'll just be walking around Dunedin and people will shout out 'Procy' and know who I am, it's crazy there. I've also played Urban Jungle twice now, which is a big festival in Christchurch and at this most recent New Year's I played at Rolling Meadows. They're also pinnacle moments. Do you think people have a bit of a misconception when it comes to the musicality that goes into drum and bass DJing? A lot of people think it is just pressing play, because I suppose a lot of normal DJing at events or things like that is just pressing play and transitioning cleanly between songs but drum and bass is a whole different ball game. It can get quite intense because you can be blending one, two, three or even four songs at a time. One of the main things you do is doubling songs, you have one song playing, press play on another song, cue it up in your headphones, and when that sounds right, bring it up, and then you'll have two songs playing. You muddle with the EQs [equalisers] so the the bass doesn't override each other and as those songs are playing, add a third song, or even a fourth. There can be a lot involved. How often are you performing? It varies, some months I'll have two, three gigs but then I could go two months without gig just due to the fact I live in Timaru. Promoters often have to think about travel. Timaru has never had a big scene but it was starting to grow, I had my first gig here and they were coming in quite consistently. I think a lot of people involved in the Timaru shows moved away and there hasn't been one here for a year. Christchurch is definitely the hot spot in New Zealand for it but I get asked to play in all sorts of different places now like Dunedin, Queenstown and Auckland. What is your ultimate goal when it comes to your career? I'd love to be able to start producing my own music, because that's not something I've actually got into yet. Music is a form of art and lives forever so having my own out there that I can use in sets or other DJ's use is one of my main goals. It would also unlock way more opportunities because producing artists are the ones that get booked overseas. I have a few United Kingdom connections so I'd love to get over there and play because that is the home of that style of music.
NZ Herald
06-05-2025
- General
- NZ Herald
Colin McCahon painting mystery: How a $225 auction ‘sleeper' sold for $31,000
'We did not know what it was or who it was by,' said Andrew Swain, head of pictures. Headlines allege what happened next: 'Painting by New Zealand's leading modern artist takes £14,000 after being identified by Fernhurst auctioneer' reported online news site Sussex World. Did someone on the other side of the world really just score a McCahon for $31,000? While Swain last week replied to an initial email from the New Zealand Herald neither he, nor a public relations company for John Nicholson's, have responded to two follow-up emails seeking to clarify how Lot 176 came to be reported as a McCahon. It was certainly not listed as such in the auction catalogue and an £80-£100 sales estimate gave no suggestion this was an auction to watch. There were, arguably, other clues. On the reverse of the painting there was a title, initials and a date – Truth from the King Country Load Bearing Structures, '78. Search the internet for that information and turn up 1300-plus results leading to a single artist's name: Colin John McCahon. Did John Nicholson's Fine Art Auctioneers and Valuers research the painting's title? Does it have more information on the work's provenance or ownership history? How many people bid on the work? What factors led to its initial price estimate? Swain has not responded to these questions, but last week told the Herald: 'We had no requests for condition reports or extra photographs so had no inkling until the bidding started at £75 and quickly accelerated to over £10,000, much to the delight of the auctioneer and the people (including the vendor) in the saleroom. 'When something sells at auction at a high price, but having had a low guide price, it is known in the trade as a 'sleeper',' Swain said. 'You rarely get them these days as the internet and interest generated from it usually gives an auctioneer some clue before the auction day that what they have is more valuable than otherwise thought.' The Herald understands at least one Auckland auction house that has been approached about the work will not be offering it for sale. In New Zealand, the most valuable artwork ever sold at public auction was by Colin McCahon – $2.39 million, paid in 2022. The last time anything by the Timaru-born artist's Truth from the King Country series went to auction locally, bidding stopped just short of $106,000. The Sussex-sold painting has the hallmarks of a work from that series. 'I've made 31 paintings called Truth from the King Country & am on the next 6 now,' McCahon wrote in a 1978 letter to his friend, Ron O'Reilly. 'All small & lovely - yellow, orange, toad green & black - they have taken me 3 months to make. I have been handing them out as gifts to Dunedin people who I owe something to.' Colin McCahon's Truth from the King Country: Load Bearing Structures (Large) No. 6 was sold by Auckland's Art + Object for $89,300 in 2017. Photo / Greg Bowker The version just sold in the United Kingdom was described as 'black T shape on green and yellow background'. Not noted in the auction catalogue text, but evident from accompanying photographs, was a further identifier – the phrase 'large 6' painted inside a small white rectangle. Truth from the King Country comprises multiple sub-series, one of which is called 'Large'. Three images from the 'Large' sub-series – 5, 6 and 7 – are easily searchable via an online catalogue of works authenticated by the Colin McCahon Research and Publication Trust. Curiously, a 'Large 6″ is also searchable via the New Zealand Herald. In 2017, the Herald ran photographs of it to illustrate the differences between an authenticated work from the 'Large' Truth sub-series and another ('Large 8') that had sold for a song at an auction in Surrey, England. Confused? Compare the authenticated 'Large 6' with the similarly titled work sold last month in Sussex, and they look nothing alike – until you turn them over. A screenshot of an image presented in an online catalogue listing for a painting that sold last month at auction in England for approximately $31,000. Truth from the King Country: Load bearing structures (Large) 6 is a verified Colin McCahon painting, auctioned at Auckland's Art + Object in Auckland in 2017. Photo / Greg Bowker Peter Simpson, local McCahon scholar and author of multiple books about the artist, says it is 'always hard to be certain' about the authenticity of a painting, even with access to the original. He said photographs of the reverse of the Sussex-sold work showed it shared many characteristics with known authenticated examples from the series, but: 'I am doubtful if this is an original McCahon.' Simpson says the dimensions listed in the auction catalogue for the Sussex-based work indicated a painting that was 'considerably smaller' than other known 'Large' examples. He also says a gap between the top of the black 'T' (the Tau cross) and the edge of the painting is not consistent with other works he has seen from that sub-series. Meanwhile, the arrangement of the hills, with a separating ridge, was unlike anything he had observed across the entirety of the Truth series. 'These do not look like King Country hills ... The painting of the hills, while McCahon-like, does not strike my eye as authentic – more likely a clever copy by someone closely familiar with the series.' Simpson notes the existence of an already recorded 'Large 6' on the Colin McCahon database. 'Colin was careful with his documenting and although he did occasionally make mistakes – spelling mistakes for example – it is extremely unlikely he would have given two works the same number.' In 2017, it was Simpson who told the Herald the 'Large 8' that had been sold in the United Kingdom was unlikely to have been a lost McCahon. 'I don't think so,' he said. 'When I first saw it, I thought it looked genuine. The thing that has made me the most dubious is the handwriting. Although it's a fair imitation of Colin's hand, if you compare it closely, there are all sorts of differences in the way that individual letters are formed.' More recently, in 2021, Auckland's International Art Centre halted the $87,000 sale of a work called Truth from the King Country: Load Bearing Structures: Series Three while it tried to establish a more complete ownership trail. Back then, Simpson noted anomalies in the information on that painting's reverse, but also said 'if this particular work is a forgery, it is infinitely more sophisticated than any I've seen'. Commenting this week on why the Truth series might be more susceptible to copies than other McCahon's, Simpson pointed to the sheer number of works across the various sub-series ('nearly 40') and the relative simplicity of the design. 'Dark T against hill and sky – not too hard to copy perhaps. The works are smallish, but valuable. Most sell these days for around $100,000 ... a great return for smallish effort if you can bring it off.' It's not impossible a previously unknown McCahon could make it to auction. Last year, when the Colin McCahon Trust launched a major project to preserve and revitalise its ageing digital archive of more than 1800 works, it called for owners of potentially uncatalogued works to come forward. Colin McCahon's grandsons, Peter Carr (left) and Finn McCahon-Jones, photographed ahead of last year's launch of a two-year legacy project to revitalise the ageing online database of the artist's works. Photo / Michael Craig Finn McCahon, trustee and the artist's grandson, noted that McCahon was known in Australia, collectors had taken his work to the UK and, in 1958, he had travelled to America with his wife and fellow artist Anne (nee Hamblett). 'His practice has legs, and for people who understand contemporary art, he fits into this global context. So we don't know what's happened behind closed doors out there.' In a statement to the Herald last week, Peter Carr, trust chairman and the artist's eldest surviving grandson, said while a number of people had made contact with the trust, no previously unknown paintings had come to light, 'a reflection of the strength of the irreplaceable research carried out by the Trust and academics in the early 1990s'. Carr said the trust, via a panel of experts, had a 'rigorous' process for reviewing and verifying artworks thought to be by McCahon. Because the work sold at auction in the United Kingdom last month had not been through that process, 'it was not possible to comment on its veracity ... ' Carr confirmed the trust was not aware that the work was for sale and had not had any correspondence with the auction house. Kim Knight is an award-winning arts journalist with the New Zealand Herald's lifestyle desk.
Otago Daily Times
24-04-2025
- Entertainment
- Otago Daily Times
Local actor's star on the rise in NYC
Fresh from graduating from the prestigious Atlantic Acting School, a Timaru-born actor has made her off-Broadway debut as part of the Soho Playhouse Lighthouse Series. In 2024, Kate Low returned to New Zealand during a summer break to tour the one-woman show How to Build a Gate by Electra Carzis and upon returning to New York had always been eager to bring the play to American audiences. It has now been selected to take part in the Soho Playhouse Lighthouse Series. The series is a competition-style festival aimed at showcasing emerging talent and new works in New York City. Out of hundreds of applicants, only 15 shows are selected for the first round. Each show is paired with two others over a weekend, audiences vote for their favourite and the winner of each group advances to the second round in July, when the winner is awarded a six-week residency in Soho Playhouse's main programme for 2026. Low said it was it was incredibly exciting to have had the play accepted. "We applied knowing it was a bit of a long shot as hundreds of people apply to this series. "It was very much one of those 'well, we will just send it and see what happens' applications. "We didn't have any expectation of anything really coming out of it. "We got the news and we were completely thrilled, then immediately got to work as we had a two week turnaround to put it up again." She said having the chance to make her off-broadway debut at the iconic Soho Playhouse was a dream come true. "The theatre has an incredible history and to be making it with the work of a very good friend makes it even more special. "In the '60s playwright Edward Albee [Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf and The Goat] took over the space and used it as an incubator and performance house which fostered playwrights like Sam Shephard, Leroi Jones and Lanford Wilson. "I actually worked on The Goat as one of my final projects for school, so it feels weirdly serendipitous to be performing in this space just after finishing school." A few changes had to be made to the production to take part in the series, she said. "The show went through a bit of a development season when we were accepted into the first festival. It premiered at in New York — the Spark Emerging Artist Festival in March. "We sat down and did a read through of the script that was performed in New Zealand and broke down what worked within that script." She said Electra Artemis and Zora Squish Pruitt, the play's incredible writer and their dramaturg, reworked the script. "What turned the show on its head a bit was the acceptance into the Lighthouse Series meant the script had to be shortened to a 25-minute piece. "We could chose to do an excerpt from the 70-minute show, or frankenstein the script so it told a very similar story to the full show but in 25 minutes. "Electra and Squish went to work on it again and did an incredible job of cutting the show into a tight 25-minute show, while maintaining the essence and comedy of the story being told." She said it had been affirming to see the foundation she had been building at Atlantic for so many years came into fruition this way. "It is also just further affirmation that surrounding yourself with other incredibly talented, driven artists who have a love and passion for this work is a great way to go about growing and progressing in the industry. "I am so incredibly grateful to be surrounded by an amazing team to make this happen and we are so fortunate to have festivals like the Soho Playhouse Lighthouse series and the Emerging Artists Festival give up and coming artists in the city the opportunity to put up their work." She said the industry was tough and filled with high highs and low lows to navigate. "A lot of it is work that goes unseen: constantly applying for things, going to open calls, auditions, self tapes, lots of no's, networking, and just keeping yourself fit and ready for when you do book the job. "Whenever there is a win like this it is reassuring but also just incredibly exciting to get the opportunity to do the thing that we as actors are putting in all the hours behind the scenes for — to tell a story."
