Julia Stace Brooke-White - artist information
Julia Stace Brooke-White specialises in photographing fine arts and craft and natural history subjects. These interests - and a passion for islands - converge in her photography in the Pacific Islands, where she has lived and worked for many years.Recent projects include:
- Photography of the Pacific Arts Festival, July 2012, Solomon Islands. Since 1992, Julia has photographed these four-yearly festivals, where the Pacific arts are on display at their highest level. The Solomon Islands event will add to her unique record of Pacific Island culture and performance, now held in the National Library of New Zealand.
- Pursuing and collecting oral histories about conservation in New Zealand. A trained oral historian, Julia has completed a series on the history of the New Zealand Wildlife Service, funded by the Ministry of Culture and Heritage, and a series on Molesworth High-Country Station for DOC.
Above: Raoul Rough exhibition, (selected works), Photospace Gallery, 2004
Raoul Island is the largest of the Kermadec Islands, and, at 1000 km north-east of North Cape, is New Zealand's most northern territory. Julia Brooke-White's detailed colour photographs allow the viewer to explore the rich and varied textures of Raoul's landscape and flora, as well as presenting the gritty reality of conservation work.
"Raoul is very rugged, steep and remote, with a small range of plants and birds, whatever has arrived there by sea or wind. The place can seem monotonous or infinitely varied, depending on ones level of interest. I hope these photographs will convey an idea of the value the weeding programme in the restoration of endemic plant and bird life on Raoul Island."
Raoul Island is the largest of the Kermadec Islands, and, at 1000 km north-east of North Cape, is New Zealand's most northern territory. Julia Brooke-White's detailed colour photographs allow the viewer to explore the rich and varied textures of Raoul's landscape and flora, as well as presenting the gritty reality of conservation work.
"Raoul is very rugged, steep and remote, with a small range of plants and birds, whatever has arrived there by sea or wind. The place can seem monotonous or infinitely varied, depending on ones level of interest. I hope these photographs will convey an idea of the value the weeding programme in the restoration of endemic plant and bird life on Raoul Island."
Publications and collections - Julia is a major contributor of photographs to:
- Raoul and the Kermadecs - NZ's Northernmost Territory - Steven Gentry, Steele Roberts 2013
- New Flags Flying - edited by Ian Johnstone and Michael Powles, Huia 2012
- Between Tides - Jewellery by Alan Preston - by Damian Skinner, Godwit 2008
- Tea - a Potted History of Tea in New Zealand - by Suzette Goldsmith, Reed 2006
- Every Kitchen Tells a Story - by Clare de Lore, Harper Collins, 2000
- Hokitika Handmade - by Keri Hulme, Hokitika Craft Gallery Co-Op, 1999
- Icons of New Zealand - Arts Marketing Board of Aotearoa, 1994
- Yalo-i-Viti - A Fiji museum catalogue - by Fergus Clunie, 1986
- Many gallery and museum catalogues and posters of shows on Art and Craft Art
- Photographs held in private collections in New Zealand and overseas.
- While living in Fiji from 1977 to 1987, Julia was the photographer for the Fiji Museum from 1982 -1986. On her return to NZ she exhibited her Fiji series, Fiji Before, at Exposures Gallery, Wellington, in 1988. She continued to freelance in New Zealand as a specialist photographer of fine art and craft.
- With a BSc in botany as well as an Advanced Certificate of Photography, Julia has also worked and photographed in conservation and restoration projects around New Zealand and its offshore islands. From 2001 to 2003 she worked for the Department of Conservation on Raoul Island (Kermadecs), showing her photos in Raoul Rough at Photospace Gallery, 2004.
- A member of the Wellington Botanical Society, she regularly contributes articles and photographs to its publications.
- Island Style - dancing the Pacific (26 photos included), National Library of New Zealand, 2013
- After Life - Photospace, 2008
- Raoul Rough - Photospace, 2004 (with an installation by sculptor Deborah Hall)
- Pacific Numerals - Café Brava, Wellington FotoFest, 1998
- Craft in the 90s - Academy of Fine Arts, Wellington, 1995
- Fiji Before - Exposures Gallery, Wellington, 1989
Above: Afterlife exhibition, (selected works), Photospace Gallery, 2008
This collection of photographs comes out of my lifelong practice of having a camera about me wherever I go. And I go further a field than most other people, having always been a wanderer. Transfixed by a view, a plant, a corpse; if I can't take my eyes off it, I photograph it. I need to store this image away. Those I fail to respond to in this way haunt me for much longer.
With dead things, one can look and look at all their detail. They are so still. The urgent question is why are they so different in death? What is it that has departed? It is something invisible - the mysterious life force.
Why is it proper to be repulsed by dead creatures when they can be looked at differently, without revulsion, through a lens? Before us is inevitably what we will all become.
- Julia Stace Brooke-White, 2008
This collection of photographs comes out of my lifelong practice of having a camera about me wherever I go. And I go further a field than most other people, having always been a wanderer. Transfixed by a view, a plant, a corpse; if I can't take my eyes off it, I photograph it. I need to store this image away. Those I fail to respond to in this way haunt me for much longer.
With dead things, one can look and look at all their detail. They are so still. The urgent question is why are they so different in death? What is it that has departed? It is something invisible - the mysterious life force.
Why is it proper to be repulsed by dead creatures when they can be looked at differently, without revulsion, through a lens? Before us is inevitably what we will all become.
- Julia Stace Brooke-White, 2008
