What the critics say

Four Pacific Island artists have received the inaugural Arts Pasifika Awards, set up by the Pacific Arts Committee of Creative New Zealand.

Three were present at last week's ceremony at the Pacific Business Trust's South Markets venue in Papatoetoe: tenor Benjamin Fifita Makisi, who received the $6500 Iosefa Enari Memorial Award; artist Johnny Penisula, given the $6500 Senior Pacific Islands Artist Award; and sculptor Richard Shortland Cooper, who received the $5000 Pacific Innovation and Excellence Award.

Film maker Peter Panoa, who received the $3000 Emerging Pacific Islands Artist Award, is based in Sydney, where he is head of the cinematography department at the School of Visual Arts.

Makisi, who sang Nessun Dorma from Turandot during his acceptance speech, was close to tears as he paid tribute to his former mentor Enari, the highly respected baritone who died suddenly in 2000 at 46. Makisi has completed his masters degree in music performance at the Sydney Conservatorium and will tour nine centres in New Zealand with NBR Opera's production of The Barber of Seville next year.

Penisula is also regarded as a mentor to younger artists, and he tutors part-time at the Southland Institute of Technology. Cooper, whose millennium sculpture He Taonga Hiranga Whakanui Whanau graces Manukau City Centre, is working on his fine arts doctorate at Elam, while Panoa - the first Samoan New Zealander accepted into the Australian Film, Television and Radio School - is working towards a short film set in Samoa and New Zealand.

Summer with the Met:

The new season on Concert FM of ChevronTexaco New York Metropolitan Opera series debuts on January 12 with Beethoven's Fidelio, directed by Jurgen Flimm and featuring Waltraud Meier and Hei-Kyung Hong. The series continues each Sunday at 3pm until May 25. Highlights include new productions of Bellini's Il Pirata, William Bolcom's adaptation of Arthur Miller's A View from the Bridge, Janacek's Jenufa and Berlioz's Les Troyens, while there are also stagings of Faust, Parsifal, Otello, Die Fledermaus, Carmen, Turandot, Il Trovatore, Elektra and The Rake's Progress. Singers include real-life couple Roberto Alagna and Angela Gheorghiu, Jennifer Larmore, Karita Mattila, Renee Fleming and Placido Domingo.

Perkel Opera:

Last week's book review of Nicholas Tarling's history of opera in Auckland over the past 30 years has alerted Cyril Kelleway, one of the co-founders of Perkel Opera in Auckland from 1974-88, to the urgency of recording that company's history. Kelleway, who set up Perkel with Paul Person, writes: "We have been asked time and time again about writing a book covering the 14 years that Perkel Opera was in existence. Many of the people who were involved have passed on or moved, and it will be even harder the longer it is left. I have a number of articles, critiques and programmes, but am in need of anything which covers this period."

If you can help Kelleway with any information or memorabilia, contact him at: ayceekay@paradise.net.nz; or c/- 36 St Leonards Rd, Kelston, Auckland 1007.

A brief pause:

This is the final Arts On Monday section for the year. We take a short break before resuming service on January 13. It's been an exciting year in the arts, and we look forward to covering an even stronger performance in all facets of the arts next year.

If Auckland Art Gallery's magnificent Love & Death exhibition has whetted your appetite for Victorian art, don't miss A Tale to Tell, narrative paintings from the gallery's collection. J.W. Waterhouse's Lamia (pictured) looks sweet and romantic but look closely and you'll see that Lamia's shawl is snakeskin and as the myth has it, she is a monstrous creature who seduces then kills young men. The noble knight in the painting is, then, doomed.

Artists in the show include Frederic Leighton, John Millais, Sir Lawrence Alma-Tadema, James Tissot and Frank Bramley. Curator Mary Kisler says all the paintings have a story to tell. Opens in the Upper Wellesley Gallery on Saturday.