Pacific Mix
Eleven-piece New Zealand band Te Vaka travelled to Macau where they enchanted the audience with the sound of the South Pacific, just as they have done at venues throughout the world…
News of New Zealanders via Global Media
Wilson pitches the unpitchable
Christchurch comedian Cal Wilson is part of this year’s Melbourne International Comedy Festival, performing on March 29 in Axed! The show is billed as “stories of the unpitchable, unprintable and unwatchable” and the…
Kezia comes alive
Katherine Mansfield’s Prelude and Carnation are amongst four of the writer’s short stories adapted for theatre and performed by Toronto’s Theatre Smith-Gilmour, celebrated for their stage adaptations of Chekhov. The Mansfield…
Tunnel Museum Opens
During the Great War beneath the unassuming French town of Arras and the German enemy, the New Zealand Tunnelling Company built two interconnected tunnels, almost 20km long and able to hide 25,000 troops. The…
Tour of Auckland
The Flight of the Conchord’s manager Murray Hewitt, Aucklander Rhys Darby, introduces the Guardian‘s Sarah Bourn to New Zealand’s largest city and his favourite place, One Tree Hill. “I used to go there a…
Contemporary Navigation
Dancer and choreographer Jeremy Nelson’s latest performance Sail, is inspired by his childhood in New Zealand; inspired by the sea, the Maori haka and rugby. Nelson performed Sail at New York’s Danspace Project,…
Alaskan War Chant
Taranaki basketball player Jeremiah Trueman, 19, has introduced New Zealand’s haka to his Alaskan team, the UAA Seawolves, and the crowds love it. Trueman, a junior transfer to the Seawolves, said he was trying…
Twain’s Tramping Track
Motatapu Track, which cuts across a Central Otago high country property owned by Canadian country singer Shania Twain, has officially opened. The 28km track is part of Te Araroa/The Long Pathway – a walkway…
Maconie Explains Stockhausen on War
Composer and musicologist New Zealand-born Robin Maconie writes about celebrated German composer Karlheinz Stockhausen’s controversial statement after September 9/11, in which he called the terrorist attacks “the greatest work of art” ever. Maconie writes:…
Peak Inspiration
In preparation for a race to the South Pole, adventurer Ben Fogle hits the South Island for some thrill-seeking training. “The country that staged the world’s first commercial bungee jump has invented a whole…
Off-Stage Antics
Wellington-born musician and “New York Rock God” Dean Wareham formed the band Luna in 1992 and later, together with his second wife Britta Phillips, Dean & Britta. Black Postcards is Wareham’s…
Kiwi Hatched in US
Washington DC’s Smithsonian National Zoo has successfully hatched a rare North Island Brown kiwi, their third since 1975. The Smithsonian is one of only four zoos outside New Zealand to successfully breed the…
Titillating Fantasy
Artist Hye Rim Lee, graduate of Inter-media from Auckland’s Elam School of Fine Arts, has her first American solo exhibition at New York’s Max Lang Gallery entitled, Crystal City. Originally from Korea,…
On Financial Restraint
New Zealander Robert Wade, Professor of Political Economy and Development at the London School of Economics and Political Science and author of Governing the Market, debates global finance with the UK’s leading economic commentator…
Portable stories
Wellington production company Gibson Group’s made-for-mobile drama series My Story has been purchased by French conglomerate Lagardère Group from ohm:tv, a Cologne-based developer and distributer of TV formats, programmes and mobile phone content. Produced…
Dale’s no loony
New Zealand actor and Ugly Betty star Alan Dale treads the West End boards in his debut appearance as King Arthur in the comedy Spamalot at London’s Palace Theatre. Dale was born in Dunedin…
Christchurch Blackout
On 29 March from 8pm, Christchurch joins 23 cities worldwide in turning off their lights for climate change. Earth Hour was first held in Sydney last year and was organised by the World Wide…
Massive Robotics
New Zealand software company Massive, famous for its on-screen swarms of pillaging orcs in The Lord of the Rings trilogy, recently showcased new business potential in Hanover, Germany. This included engineering, architecture and robotics….
Memory in Bronze
Air Chief Marshal Sir Keith Park, the New Zealander who led the Battle of Britain against Germany in 1940, deserves recognition from the city of London according to British politicians and senior…
Virgin’s Cable Guy
Neil Berkett has been promoted to a permanent role as chief executive at Virgin Media. Berkett took on the job at the cable company as acting chief executive in August last year when Steve…
Snell’s Still Running
Olympic champion and New Zealand’s greatest athlete of the 20th century Peter Snell looks back over the last 70 years and discusses, age, Auckland and Arthur Lydiard. Now based in Dallas and…
Donaldson’s heist
Director Roger Donaldson’s The Bank Job is the latest flick from the film-maker who began his career in New Zealand with Sleeping Dogs in 1977. Bank Job is “solid entertainment”, according to Los Angeles…
Promises Reviewed
Dunedin indie band Die! Die! Die! is currently touring Los Angeles and Austin, Texas to promote their latest album Promises, Promises released in the US in February. Die! Die! Die! may sound less like…
Skier Continues Streak
Otago paralympian Adam Hall has slalomed to yet another victory at the Wells Fargo Disabled Invitational at Winter Park in Colorado, climbing to the top of the medal table winning gold, his seventh medal this…
All for a Chat Show
Twenty-two year old Christchurch design student Nick Lowe wants to raise $1 million on YouTube in the hope of millionaire-status and a spot on Ellen Degeneres’ talk show. This week Lowe passed the $1,000…
Windy Farewell
Paddy Gillooly owns a tourism company in New Zealand which takes visitors by jeep or all-terrain bus to the tip of the South Island’s Farewell Spit, one of only two companies permitted the…
Slimming with Rachel
Model and reality TV show host Rachel Hunter is the face, and figure, of US weight loss brand Slim-Fast. Advertising agency Ogilvy & Mather chose Hunter because she embraced a more realistic body type….
Tips for the Irish
Irish sheep farmers are looking to their New Zealand counterparts for advice on how to make more money tending their flocks. Lincoln University’s Dr John Hickford spoke at two conferences in Kilkenny and Athlone…
Leap for Frogkind
Thirteen tiny, and extremely rare, Maud Island froglets have been spotted at Wellington’s Karori Wildlife Sanctuary hitching a ride on the back of a fully grown male. Researcher Kerri Lukis said the frogs have…
Brown the New Nobilo
Wellington golfer Mark Brown has had a successful week in India, winning first the Asian Tour’s SAIL Open then clinching the US$2.5 million Johnnie Walker Classic, making him one of only six New…
Debut at the Met
New Zealand baritone Teddy Tahu Rhodes made news again this week with a number of glowing reviews for his first role at New York’s Metropolitan Opera in Benjamin Britten’s Peter Grimes. The New York…
NZ Whaler Doco
The BBC is making a documentary about ex-Royal New Zealand Montague Whaler, the Essex which sunk in the South Pacific in 1819 whilst chasing an aggressive sperm whale. The Essex was twice rammed, the…
Beyond the Ugg
No longer are New Zealand’s fashion tastes being derided for unbecoming tracksuits and shoes, the local fashion industry is pinning the country on the style map. New Zealand is now home to a vibrant…
Godwits Fly
Every year, godwits fly from Alaska to New Zealand in an astonishing six days. A Seattle-based husband and wife team have been following the migratory patterns of the tiny bird and write about their…
Smith’s Cool Design
Massey University Industrial Design student Aucklander Stephen Smith is New Zealand’s top emerging designer winning a $3,000 Dyson Product Design Award for his “Arctic Skin”. The vest stabilizes a sportsperson’s body temperature via a…
Finn unpacked
Auckland artist Martin Ball’s portrait of singer Neil Finn is up for Australia’s most prestigous art award, the Archibald Prize. Ball won the Archibald Packing Room prize, selected annually by backroom staff at the…
Abel Tasman Charms
Sea kayaking in the Abel Tasman National Park is “just gorgeous”, “picture perfect” and definitely not short on assets”, writes travel editor Jeanti St Clair about her three-day paddle around New Zealand’s smallest Park….
Shadows at Pataka
Porirua’s Pataka Museum is building on ties with the American Haille Ford Museum in an exhibition of North American Indian prints called ‘Crow’s Shadows’, put on in conjunction with Wellington’s International Festival of…
Laureate discovers
Wellington poet Bill Manhire is profiled in The Age as a man who quite accidentally fell upon letters, who secretly wrote at school until he read Walt Whitman in his final year at school….
Bridging the Gap
On New Zealand’s Chatham Islands researchers have discovered the country’s oldest known bird fossils. The find represents four new seabirds dating back some 65 million years when New Zealand separated from supercontinent, Gondwana. Excavation…
Quick Sale
Two Yorkshire property developers are enthusiastic about the benefits of investing in property in New Zealand; Ian Payling and Dave Rothwell-Wood built the ‘Lemon-Tree house’ on land north of Auckland. Once the sale was…
Marsh Remembered
Christchurch-born writer Dame Ngaio Marsh has been named one of the Daily Telegraph’s 50 favourite crime writers, with Vintage Murder (1937) recommended. Marsh is described as “a New Zealander who created a quintessentially English…
Full dance card
New Zealand singer/songwriter Liam Finn is in Brooklyn, New York playing at the Music Hall of Williamsburg before an interview on Letterman and a tour as support act for Pearl Jam frontman Eddie Vedder….
NZ Director Airs at Super Bowl
In just 30 seconds, Wellington ad director Paul Middleditch made his mark at this year’s Super Bowl. Sydney-based Middleditch created the NZ$3.4 million one-off slot for Diet Pepsi Max, at his sixth…
Vintner Role for Paikea
New Zealand actress Keisha Castle-Hughes, has begun filming The Vintner’s Luck, based on Elizabeth Knox’s novel of the same name and directed by Niki Caro. Castle-Hughes told the New Zealand Herald she…
Ngati Filmmaker Remembered
Barry Barclay, New Zealand film director and the first Maori to direct a feature film has died, aged 63, in Rawene. Barclay’s Ngati won best film at Italy’s Taormina Film Festival in 1987 and…
Bursting Into Canzone
New Zealand bass-baritone Paul Whelan stepped out of the audience and onto the stage to sing the part of Raimundo at a London Coliseum performance of Lucia di Lammermoor. Whelan, who is due to…
Greenhouse Boom
New Zealand vineyards are benefiting from a warming planet, prompting traditionally cooler areas of the country to cultivate grapes and a bright forecast for export growth. Pinot noirs from the South Island region of…
West Coast Purity
Sydney Morning Herald writer Anthony Dennis travels to the South Island’s West Coast and marvels the glow-worms beneath a “pristine sky … so starry it looks as if it’s been attacked by a…
New Exec at Opera House
Sydney’s most famous landmark is now presided over by New Zealander Richard Evans, who last month became chief executive at the Opera House. Among the challenges Evans will face, is raising some NZ$790…
Drawn on difference
Preeminent documentary photographer Mark Adams is making his North American debut with the exhibition Tatau: Samoan Tattooing and Global Culture at Canada’s Ontario College of Art & Design. The exhibition explores the Samoan…
Rhodes vies for Bianca
New Zealand baritone Teddy Tahu Rhodes performs in Rossini’s Bianca e Fallierio at Washington D.C’s Lisner Auditorium in April. Rhodes stars as Capellio, Fallierio’s rival for the affections of Bianca. Rhodes won New Zealand’s…
Pseudonym on show
Auckland artist et al.’s installation altruistic studies features at the world renowned Swiss exhibition Art Basel 39 in June. Et al. won New Zealand’s prestigious Walters Prize in 2003 for restricted…
Microsoft’s Gatekeeper
Christopher Liddell, Chief Financial Officer at Microsoft since 2005, and the former senior New Zealand business leader is the architect of Microsoft’s recent $44.6 billion takeover offer for Yahoo. Liddell is now dealing with…
Tastebuds Will Travel
Guardian reporter Emma Johns and friend spent a two-week culinary tour of New Zealand “exploring the local flavours before attempting to recreate them ourselves.” From fine-dining in Wellington to cooking lamb fillet off a…
Indian Love Affair
More Indian tourists than ever are coming to New Zealand for the expansive scenery, favourable weather conditions and a bit of romance. In 2006-20007, as many as 20,946 Indians spent an average of 13.8…
