Tim Hunt

Ngati Pakeha

Tim writes: “Working with stone gives me a real feeling of peace and connectedness. I walk around the beach at Pukerua Bay to collect the stone and it’s a whole world of sea and sky, of trees and birds, and that feeling stays with me when I’m back in the shed working on the next pieces. Onewa to me is a humble but beautiful material. A huge amount of Aotearoa is made up of it, so it’s not in danger of getting used up any time soon. And for me it is the stone that occurs nearest to where I live, so I have that personal connection to it. I don’t feel like I want to work on radical new designs – I just want the stone to speak for itself. For me, carving has been a pathway and a journey, and I plan to continue to follow it”.

Tim was born in Christchurch in 1964 and now lives at Paekakariki on the Kapiti Coast where he practices a range of tattooing from Maori and Polynesian, to Celtic and abstract in his own studio Pacific Tattoo. He continues to carve stone (mainly onewa) and shell. He received a Craft Council grant around 1988, and he has sold work through Fingers gallery in Auckland.

He began his journey in 1986 in Wellington, when he moved into a flat where there were some basic hand-carving tools. He had some help from Chris Bone, who introduced him to materials such as shell, ebony, coconut shell, plastic, brass and aluminium. He moved out to the Kapiti Coast a year later and found that Doug Marsden was living in the same street – he gave him further guidance and exposure to new materials, but Tim continued working mainly in bone over the next few years when living at Bethels Beach and Otaki.

Having a family to support saw him branch out into learning tattooing techniques. At this time his carving was influenced by Chas Dougherty and George Nuku, from whom he learned techniques of working in stone. “The thing that I loved most about stone was the amazing raw beauty of the material. I still really love the plain strength of a simple design created in such a beautiful and powerful medium.”

After this he and Ross McCabe worked a couple of years with Gordon Toi, who gave him the strongest and most direct mentoring, showing him glimpses of the zen-jedi dimension of art. Steve Myhre also helped him with further techniques and materials. “I have followed tattooing fulltime since then, but I still try to carve a bit each week.”

“I would like to thank all the people who gave me what I needed to get on the path I now follow.”