International Film Festivals coming to Gallery

The German International Film Festival, supported by the Goethe Institut, has screenings continuing at the Gallery every Sunday until 7 November.

The popular Latin American and Spain Film Festival will present 16 screenings of eight recent films, with support from the Embassy of Brazil, from 21 to 29 October.

The Japanese Film Festival, presented by The Embassy of Japan in cooperation with the Japan Foundation, will present six recent Japanese films, with English subtitles, over the weekend of 30 and 31 October.

And from 18 November the headline act comes to town with the New Zealand International Film Festival screening both at the Gallery and New Plymouth’s Event Theatres. 

In addition, the Gallery has secured New Zealand Opera On Screen’s performance of Handel’s Semele on 29 October and 6 November.

“Since the opening of the Len Lye Centre in 2015 the Gallery has presented a lively and diverse cinema programme to locals and visitors, and has become a destination for unique and interesting cinematic content,” says gallery director Zara Stanhope.

“Our team is really committed to sourcing and securing the best international and national film festivals to the people of Ngāmotu and presenting them in the Len Lye Centre’s Cinema.”

“Over recent years we have built relationships with the Festival organisers, embassies and international cultural institutions who have had really positive visits to New Plymouth and the Govett-Brewster.”

The Cinema is something of a hidden gem in the heart of the Len Lye Centre. Year-round it offers a wide array of independent and art-house movies, exhibition-related content and film festivals and workshops in the high-tech 62-seat space.

Screening times and information on all films and festivals is available on the Govett Brewster Art Gallery’s website at www.govettbrewster.com, under the What’s On and Cinema tabs.

Fast Facts: The Govett-Brewster Art Gallery / Len Lye Centre and Len Lye Centre cinema

The Gallery is part of New Plymouth’s cultural infrastructure, and features distinctive gallery spaces, a 62-seat cinema, a shop and adjoins Monica’s Eatery café.
The Len Lye Centre Cinema opened within the Len Lye Centre in 2015, and offers a high-tech 62-seat cinema within the Gallery.
The Cinema offers a range of films year-round, including exhibition-related content, a regular art-house and independent film programme, and numerous international festivals and workshops.
Govett-Brewster Art Gallery was founded on Monica Brewster’s visionary understanding of the cultural value contemporary art offers for New Plymouth, and opened in 1970.
Its focus has been on contemporary art and working with the legacy of Len Lye’s practice since 1977.

NOTES TO EDITORS:

For enquiries please contact:

Glenn McLean
Media advisor

06 759 8265 | 027 530 0233

Glenn.mclean@npdc.govt.nz

About Govett-Brewster Art Gallery / Len Lye Centre

The Govett-Brewster Art Gallery is New Zealand’s contemporary art museum in the coastal city of New Plymouth, Taranaki on the North Island of Aotearoa New Zealand. Since opening in 1970, the Gallery has dedicated itself to innovative programming, focused collection development and audience engagement. It has earned a strong reputation nationally and internationally for its global vision and special commitment to contemporary art of the Pacific. The Govett-Brewster is also home to the collection and archive of the seminal modernist filmmaker and kinetic sculptor Len Lye (1901–1980).

The Govett-Brewster Art Gallery was founded with a gift to the city of New Plymouth, from one of its greatest ‘Friends’ Monica Brewster (née Govett). A globetrotter before the age of air travel, Monica Brewster envisaged an art museum for her hometown that would be an international beacon for the art and ideas of the current day - the sort she had become familiar with on her global travels.

The Govett-Brewster continues in the legacy of Monica Brewster by taking on and presenting the most provocative, audacious and confident works of art in the global arts landscape.

The greatly expanded museum re-launched on 25 July 2015 with the addition of the Len Lye Centre. With its curved exterior walls of mirror-like stainless steel, the Govett-Brewster Art Gallery / Len Lye Centre is the country’s first example of destination architecture linked to contemporary art.

This latest addition to the Govett-Brewster - the Len Lye Centre - is New Zealand’s first institution dedicated to a single artist, the pioneering filmmaker and kinetic sculptor, Len Lye.

In 1964 Len Lye said “Great architecture goes fifty-fifty with great art”.

The Len Lye Centre building, adjoining the Govett-Brewster Art Gallery, is an example of innovative thinking in both engineering and architecture. The architects are Patterson Associates, one of New Zealand’s most internationally recognised architectural firms.

The new Len Lye Centre features Lye’s work in kinetic sculpture, film, painting, drawing, photography, batik and writing, as well as related work by contemporary and historical artists.

It also houses a state-of-the-art 62-seat cinema – a welcoming environment for audiences to experience Len Lye’s films, local and international cinema, cult, arthouse and experimental films, and regular festival programming.

The Govett-Brewster Art Gallery building in New Plymouth closed in April 2013 for earthquake strengthening, compliance, upgrades and construction of the Len Lye Centre.

The Govett-Brewster / Len Lye Centre is owned and operated by the New Plymouth District Council, which governs the museum under the terms of the founding Monica Brewster Trust Deed and through the Len Lye Committee of Council which formally manages the relationship between Council, Len Lye Foundation, and Govett-Brewster staff.
 

About Len Lye

A visionary New Zealander, an inspirational artist, a pioneer of film; Len Lye is one of the most important and influential artists to emerge from New Zealand.

Len Lye was an experimental filmmaker, poet, painter, kinetic sculptor and creative visionary ahead of his time. Most of his works were so revolutionary that technology literally had to catch up to him – meaning much of Lye’s work was not realised in his own lifetime.

Lye’s iconic 45-metre kinetic sculpture Wind Wand sways gently on New Plymouth's Coastal Walkway. The Wind Wand that glows red at night, is the first large outdoor sculpture to be built posthumously from his plans and drawings.

In 1977 Lye returned to his homeland to oversee the first New Zealand exhibition of his work at the Govett-Brewster Art Gallery. He called it the “swingiest art gallery of the antipodes”.

Shortly before his death in 1980, Lye and his supporters established the Len Lye Foundation, to which he gifted his entire collection. His collection was gifted on the condition that a suitable and permanent home be created in which his works could be fully realised.