Barry Rosenberg

I was in the library, waiting to speak to a dear friend, a librarian. She was busy serving a queue of people, and I happened to be of semi-frantic mind at the moment, my brain spinning too fast to stand about and wait.

Figuring to return later, I was on my way out when something, some thing, pulled me into the attached gallery.

I often feel a slight embarrassment encountering Māori craft and artistry. Here’s me, a lover of art, spent so much time in my younger life strolling through major galleries in Paris and Firenze; yet I’ve been in New Zealand 46 years and have allowed myself so little time and opportunity to take in creative indigenous works. Nonetheless, time to kill that morning, into the gallery I stepped. A very kindly Māori woman approached.

She would guide me through the exhibit if I so wished. Now, one of my pet peeves is a guide in an art gallery explaining what my eyes are seeing, my mind recording. I thanked her and moved off on my own.

I mindlessly whisked through a few exhibits, noting they were pleasing and strong. And then i stepped into the main gallery. And everything within me came to a screeching halt.

On the walls were three dozen or so large framed portraits of old Māori women, all with blue moko. I was completely mesmerised. I was blown out.

These magnificent portraits were painted not by a Māori artist, rather a Prague-born German by the name of Harry Stengl, who emigrated to this country in the 1960s.

I spent several minutes in that large space, allowing myself to stand for a minute or more before every single portrait, any anxieties I might have had just shortly before wiped clean. I was in another world, an alternate universe.

I cannot tell you whether Stengl, born in 1928, is still alive. I have no idea of his background. But boy, did I sense what this man was feeling when he encountered these magnificent women, capturing their souls, telling me of their lives with his magic brush.