Wallace award to Auckland painter

* Auckland artist Peter Gibson Smith has won the 2001 Wallace Art Award with a work entitled the 750-Painting that reinvents the work of classical masters Botticelli, Piera della Francesca and Masaccio.

The award is the most prominent in the country and Gibson Smith takes home $17,000, a sculpture by Terry Stringer and a round-the-world air ticket. A jury of five selected the winner from 551 entries.

* Celebrated mime artist Marcel Marceau will give three rare performances at the Civic Theatre in Auckland in December.

Marceau, 78, is acknowledged as the supreme exponent of mime. Despite his age, he reportedly retains much of his lithe spryness. His show will re-present his classic character Bip.

Bookings from today.

* As foreshadowed in Arts on Monday, Jonathan Alver is stepping down as director of NBR New Zealand Opera. Replacing him from March 2002 will be Alex Reedijk, executive director of the New Zealand International Festival of Arts.

Robin Congreve is relinquishing his position as chairman of the opera in favour of Wellington lawyer David Gasgoigne. Gasgoigne, a familiar figure in arts administration, is on the board of Te Papa and has chaired many organisations, notably the International Festival of Arts and the Film Commission.

Alex Reedijk is executive director of the New Zealand International Festival of the Arts. His career includes extensive experience in production management and technical direction in theatre, ballet and opera here and overseas.

During the 1980s and 1990s Reedijk worked in the UK for several major arts festivals and opera companies, returning to New Zealand in 1991 as technical director of the New Zealand Festival.

The new pair at the helm of NBR New Zealand Opera were among those lobbying for the merger of the Auckland and Wellington opera companies in January 2000. Alver will pursue other business interests and freelance directing.

* India Ink Theatre has confirmed that the cast for its third play, The Pickle King, will be Jacob Rajan, Madeleine Sami and Carl Bland. Theatre principals Rajan and Justin Lewis have workshopped the play in New York. The Pickle King will premiere in Hamilton next July.

Krishnan's Dairy, the duo's first play, returns for its third season in Auckland in October.