KEY POINTS:
To celebrate the arrival of Veuve Clicquot Rose NV in New Zealand, the French Champagne house has commissioned artist Gidon Bing to create a series of temporal public outdoor sculptures. Bing is an Auckland-based painter and sculptor. He has both academic and formal training as a sculptor and has lived and worked in Europe, the Middle East and America. His work has been acquired by collectors around the world.
The sculptures will be on display in Auckland City from September 1-October 5 at locations including Fanshawe St, Western Park, Ponsonby, Heard Reserve Parnell, the Viaduct, and a boatshed on Ngapipi Drive.
1 My workshop
Where as well as work I can also indulge in tinkering, collecting (hoarding), and drinking coffee.
2 Service at Trash Palace
Auckland's most outstanding leftfield service and a first class trash merchant. For all those goodies you used to source from the inorganic but are now too chicken to scavenge for.
3 Challah bread from La Mama's Deli, Glendowie
Traditional Shabbat challah bread, oven fresh, eaten while it's still hot, as is, out of the bag served with good tidings for the Sabbath in Hebrew with a Chinese accent. They also do a great spinach and feta cheese pastry.
4 Anchor stones, Bledisloe Place, Auckland
Representations of the "Tainui and Matahoura" anchor stones. Russell Clark's genius combination of modernist and primitivist sculptural forms in Bledisloe Place.
5 Albert Street Nasi Lemak
Nasi Lemak started out as Malay cuisine but has been adopted and adapted - you can find Chinese, Indian, Thai, and even anglicised versions. By far the best Lemak in Auckland is made by Sutep at Malaysian Noodles where traditional Malay Lemak is made even more authentic by the charm and skank of the Albert St Food Alley.
6 Monument to the Negev Brigade, Beersheba, Israel
Landscape sculptor Dani Karavan's cast concrete memorial comprises 18 different elements, including an observatory, and covers over 100 square metres. Karavan effectively pioneered environmental site-specific sculpture with this village of raw concrete sculptures.
7 Khaled's olives at The Pita House, Onehunga
The best nasty, bitter Syrian, cracked green olives by the kilo. Also good is the Arab coffee ground with cardamom, guava juice, haloumi cheese and some interesting and often hilarious political musings and solutions for peace in the Middle East.
8 Waterfront coffee Todd's home-roasted organic coffee served from a rustic DIY coffee cart outside Hammerheads and usually accompanied by the occasional anecdote or wry comment. Preferably sipped by Okahu Bay.
9 Kulka House, St Heliers
One of the few examples of authentic avant-garde architecture in New Zealand. Kulka house is refined, elegant, understated and modest. This has been achieved without any modern gimmicks or overt architectural statements. The house is a testament to Kulka's conviction that function in design should be based on human comfort and proportions.
10 The White City - Bauhaus capital Tel Aviv has an eclectic mix of two main vintages of architecture - modernism and orientalism, a reflection of the cultural mix of Eastern and European Jews and Arabs. Through the events of European, Jewish and Middle Eastern history Tel Aviv has become the home of the largest collection of buildings built in the Bauhaus style.
