Oscar Number Two for Best Director Jane Campion
Jane Campion has won her second best director Oscar, the first woman to be nominated twice for the directing prize, after also landing a nod for her 1993 film The Piano, Laura Harding reports…
News of New Zealanders via Global Media
Opera Singer Simon O’Neill Wins Grammy
Ashburton-born tenor Simon O’Neill recently won a Grammy for his work on the Los Angeles Philharmonic recording of Mahler’s Symphony No 8, under conductor Gustavo Dudamel, David Skipwith reports for Stuff. The recording received two…
Blue Plaque to Honour Margaret Scott Hawthorne
Trailblazing Irish campaigner Margaret Scott Hawthorne who made “an outstanding contribution” to women’s rights in New Zealand has been recognised with a ‘Blue Plaque’, which was unveiled on the Main Street in her birthplace,…
Ali Smith Discusses Mansfield, Woolf and War
In a piece for The Guardian, Orwell Prize winning author Ali Smith looks at how the first world war forced writers Katherine Mansfield and Virginia Woolf to rip up convention – and asks if…
Francis Upritchard Casts in Bronze for Huge Commission
New Zealand-born London-based Francis Upritchard, and Aucklander Lisa Reihana, are two of nine artists commissioned by the Art Gallery of NSW to create works that will go on display inside and outside Sydney Modern…
Tate Modern Surrealism Show Features Len Lye
An exhibition on Surrealism, co-curated by Tate Modern and the Metropolitan Museum of Art, explores the movement’s previously unacknowledged multi-culturalism. Artworks from six continents, including Oceania, explain how, says the BBC’s Matt Wilson. Surrealism…
Aldous Harding’s Latest a NY Times Critic’s Pick
“On her fourth album, Warm Chris, the New Zealand singer and songwriter delivers unpredictable but enchanting vocals and enigmatic lyrics that revel in simplicity,” Lindsay Zoladz writes in a music review for…
Brace Yourself for Peter Day’s Feature Off the Rails
New Zealander Peter Day’s “bracingly kinetic snapshot of contemporary British urban youth”, Off the Rails recently premiered at the Thessaloniki Documentary Festival. The film is reviewed by Screen Daily’s Neil Young. “Graduating from parkour and…
Solar Power the Best Song in the World
Lorde’s ‘Solar Power’ has won Best Song In The World at the BandLab NME Awards 2022, with the title track of the New Zealand pop star’s latest album, beating nine other nominated songs by…
Miruku About to Disrupt Global Dairy Industry
Founded in 2020 by former New Zealand dairy executive Amos Palfreyman (pictured left) and Israeli food tech innovator Professor Oded Shoseyov, molecular farming startup Miruku, which has been operating in stealth until now, is…
UFC’s Israel Adesanya in His Own Words
A world-class striker, an elite entertainer and an enigma on the mic – the mention of the name Israel Adesanya elicits a number of opinions from MMA fans. But for the 32-year-old UFC middleweight…
Māori Winemakers Interconnected with Whenua
In New Zealand today, there are around half a dozen Māori-owned wineries, Christina Pickard writes in a story for the February/March issue of Wine Enthusiast. New Zealand Winegrowers, the national wine body, has developed…
Lychee a Mark of Benee’s Distinct Voice
“Where 2020 debut album Hey U X saw Benee gather an impressive guest list (Lily Allen, Gus Dapperton, Bakar) to pepper her bedroom pop with outside influences, the seven-track Lychee sees the New Zealander…
Designer Veere Grenney Brings Beauty to Life
Veere Grenney could fairly be said to be a leading ‘decorators’ decorator’. Creating timelessly elegant interiors for more than 30 years, the New Zealand-born, London-based Grenney is one of the pre-eminent talents in English…
Will the Real Aldous Harding Please Stand Up?
New Zealander Aldous Harding remains in an off-kilter space throughout Warm Chris, her third collaboration with producer John Parish, who’s worked alongside PJ Harvey and Jenny Hval, among others, Madison Bloom writes for online…
Becky Manawatu’s Auē an Enthralling Bestseller
Things have gone right for New Zealand author Becky Manawatu. “Spectacularly,” Tina Makeriti writes in a review for The Guardian. “Unusually for a first book, Auē won New Zealand’s most lucrative fiction prize, the…
Vanity Fair Cover For Director Jane Campion
A decade ago, she almost walked away from movies. Now, New Zealander Jane Campion is the only woman ever nominated twice for an Oscar best director thanks to The Power of the Dog. Campion…
Bruce Glavovic Urges Climate Scientists to Strike
Sometimes, Massey University professor Dr Bruce Glavovic feels so proud to be an environmental scientist, studying coastal planning and teaching future researchers, that it moves him to tears. Other times, he wonders whether any…
Temel Ataçocuğu Walks for Peace Back to Mosque
It’s been three years since Christchurch faced a horrifying attack – and now survivor Temel Ataçocuğu has finally returned to the scene of the crime, Mehek Mazhar reports in a story for CBC Radio. Ataçocuğu…
Gender Revolution Brewing in New Zealand Rugby
One in five rugby players in New Zealand are now women, and their numbers are rising. But persistent stereotypes are proving hard to dismantle, Pete McKenzie reports for a feature in the print issue…
Andrew Barnes is Revolutionizing the Work Week
Andrew Barnes is speaking to Guardian journalist Tess McClure from one of his vineyards on Waiheke Island. On the scale of a globe, it’s a speck of land off the coast of a dot,…
Vanity Fair Looks Over Grant Major’s Back Catalogue
In ‘The Portfolio’, Vanity Fair’s ‘Awards Insider’ columnist speaks with some of this year’s most notable Oscar nominees about their entire body of nominated work. Here, The Power of the Dog production designer New…
Hundreds Held After New Zealand-Led Investigation
A two-year investigation led by the Department of Internal Affairs in New Zealand has resulted in the arrests of hundreds of people around the globe on charges of possessing and sharing child sexual abuse…
Runner Anne Audain Triumphed Over Adversity
“By the time Anne Audain came to challenge for a place in the world record books, at the age of 26 in 1982, the New Zealander had already overcome a lifetime worth of trials…
Hypebeast Interviews Entire Studios Founders
“Dylan Richards and Sebastian Hunt saw eye to eye the moment they met at 17 years old. The New Zealand-born and raised creatives yearned to be anywhere but home, where support for their vision…
Andrew Dominik’s Nick Cave Doco Hypnotises
“Illuminating tracks from the superb 2019 Bad Seeds album Ghosteen and Nick Cave’s 2021 collaboration with Warren Ellis, Carnage, this remarkable performance documentary may be for the Nick…
Our Flag Means Death Stars Waititi and Darby
“The new comedy series Our Flag Means Death was created by American writer David Jenkins and produced by the prolific Taika Waititi, who also stars as Blackbeard, to whom he brings a leonine grace,”…
In Awards Month Jane Campion Profiled
Ahead of the Baftas and Oscar ceremonies later this month, New Zealand film director Jane Campion and her director of photography, Australian Ari Wegner, discuss their nominations, filming through the pandemic – and what…
Olympic Shot Put Star Valerie Adams Retires
Two-time Olympic women’s shot put champion Rotorua-born Dame Valerie Adams has announced her retirement at the age of 37, ESPN reports. Adams also won Olympic silver and bronze medals and was a four-time world champion,…
Māori Party Asks QEII for Divorce to Heal Colonial Wounds
Among celebrations for the 70th anniversary of the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II, the Māori Party has proposed New Zealand’s “divorce” from the British Crown to heal wounds left by the colonisation of native…
New Zealand Bans LGBT+ Conversion Therapy
New Zealand has passed legislation banning conversion therapy based on a person’s sexual orientation, gender identity or gender expression. The Conversion Practices Prohibition Legislation Bill was passed almost unanimously with 112 votes in favour and…
Inside Musical Instruments with Charles Brooks
The New Zealand photographer Charles Brooks’ project “Architecture in Music” takes the viewer inside instruments, where music is created. A result achieved through a very specific technique. He explains his series to Enrico Ratto…
Silver Lake to Invest in New Zealand Rugby
Silver Lake has agreed to invest NZ$200 million in the organisation behind New Zealand’s legendary All Blacks rugby team, as the US private equity firms continue to buy into sport amid the coronavirus pandemic,…
US Shows for Auckland band The Beths
As The Beths make their way across the United States for a sold-out gig in Boston, it’s a good time to celebrate a strange band on a normal rock ’n’ roll tour. Fronted by…
Va’aiga Tuigamala a Huge Presence on the Field
Samoa-born Va’aiga Tuigamala, a former All Black, and rugby league player for Wigan Warriors and Newcastle Falcons dual-code international, has died in Auckland at the age of 52, BBC Sport reports. Tuigamala, nicknamed Inga the…
Thinking Differently with Alice Boyes
Greymouth-born former clinical psychologist, writer Alice Boyes, speaks with the UK’s New Statesman about the value of thinking differently, border restrictions in New Zealand and her experience of IVF. Boyes, who is now the…
Pandemic Effects Roil Aotearoa – End in Sight
A full two years into the pandemic and New Zealand has been roiled by the mass arrival of the Omicron variant, economic stress in the tourism and hospitality and agricultural sectors, protests against mandate…
Parris Goebel Doing Us All Proud
After choreographing a Jennifer Lopez tour at 19, the New Zealand-born, IMG Models-signed dancer Parris Goebel, 30, went on to work for some of the biggest names in music, like Justin Bieber. Now, she’s…
Getty Research Institute Acquires Max Gimblett Artist’s Book Collection
New Zealand American artist Max Gimblett ONZM has celebrated six decades of creativity with the Getty Center’s acquisition of an archive of 275 of his artist’s books. The Getty of Los Angeles is a leading…
Chrissy Teigen Insta Endorses The Caker
New Zealand-born Los-Angeles-based baker Jordan Rondel has described the moment mega-influencer and supermodel Chrissy Teigen endorsed her cake on Instagram as “surreal”, Amberleigh Jack writes for Stuff. Teigen, creator of website Cravings by Chrissy Teigen,…
Mainstream Cottons on to Talented Melanie Lynskey
After 30 years of critical acclaim, but not mainstream fame, New Zealand-born actor Melanie Lynskey is getting noticed and it feels very, very strange to her. Her show, Yellowjackets, has steadily become a hit….
Peter Jackson’s Beatles Epic Unmissable
“Nonplussed coppers, 60s London panoramas and the fab four very much alive … Peter Jackson’s film is moving and unmissable,” according to Guardian reviewer Peter Bradshaw, who rates the series five out of five…
Jane Campion Tops Oscar Nominations
Jane Campion’s The Power of the Dog has received 12 Oscar nominations, the most of any film this year. Amongst the categories, the New Zealander’s film was nominated for director, adapted screenplay and best…
James Morcan’s Anno 2020 Readies for Distributors
Filming has wrapped on Tauranga-born writer/director James Morcan’s film Anno 2020, which involved separate crews shooting cast members in Israel, China, and Italy, as well as several states within the US and Australia, with dialogue…
Freestyle Prodigy Nico Porteous on How to Fly
It’s difficult to describe what it’s like in a superpipe – the biggest class of halfpipe, used in professional competition – without actually standing in one. The feeling is unnerving, Nick Remsen writes for…
Nina Mingya Powles Explores an Otherness
New Zealand writer Nina Mingya Powles’ essay collection Small Bodies of Water “just might change the way you see the world” the Star Tribune’s Cory Oldweiler suggests. “Powles was born in Wellington, and is mixed-raced,…
Britain is Starstruck By TV’s Rose Matafeo
With the hit BBC Three show Starstruck returning to UK screens for season two, Glamour magazine catches up with its New Zealand creator and star, Rose Matafeo. “Given the sheer amount of romcoms you reference…
Wānaka’s Nico Porteous Takes Gold in Beijing
Nico Porteous has dropped the curtain on New Zealand’s greatest Winter Games, overcoming the elements and a field of established champions to win the Olympic freeski halfpipe title, Bryan Armen Graham writes for The…
Director Peter Jackson Leads Forbes Rich List
At the end of 2021 he was still making headlines with his Beatles documentary Get Back. Now Forbes magazine has named New Zealand director Sir Peter Jackson, 60, the world’s wealthiest entertainer, Germany’s Der…
Rugby League Farewells Legendary Olsen Filipaina
Pioneering Kaikohe-born rugby league great Olsen Filipaina has died at the age of 64. Filipaina was a trailblazer, George Clarke writes in a story published online at Australia’s 7News, becoming one of the first…
Dubai-Based Kathy Johnston Loves Chocolate
New Zealand-born Kathy Johnston is so in love with chocolate, she lies awake at night thinking about it. “For as long as I can remember, I have been obsessed,” she says. But as chief…
New Zealanders in Vietnam Thrive Despite Covid
As Covid continues to cut a disruptive swath through Asia, expatriate communities have been hit hard. In the unique situation of living far from home in Vietnam, a trio of New Zealanders shared their…
Enter the World of S Asian Talent With Anita Chhiba
Employing her community platform Diet Paratha to shine a spotlight on emerging South Asian talent, New Zealander Anita Chhiba, 31, is fighting the good fight against archaic systems of power in the global creative…
Meet Todd Antony’s Subjects from Sierra Leone
In Sierra Leone, the beautiful game is proving to be a source of joy and empowerment for amputee footballers, writes Deborah Nicholls-Lee for UK journalism magazine, Positive News. “They’re just phenomenal athletes,” said New…
1922 – A Year of Katherine Mansfield and Other Great Modernists
“James Joyce’s Ulysses and T.S. Eliot’s The Waste Land are rightly hailed as masterpieces – but they unfairly overshadow 1922’s other great books,” writes John Self in a feature for the BBC, which explores…
Photographer Rebecca Zephyr Thomas Lights Up
As the chaotic fashions of the early 2000s are poised for revival, according to Dazed’s Emily Dinsdale, New Zealand-born photographer Rebecca Zephyr Thomas shares her images from the first time around for an art…
