'The Matukituki'

Oil painting on canvas by Grant McSherry. 1200 mm x 800 mm.

The Matukituki Valley is a key gateway to Mt Aspiring National Park and is a place of great beauty. As a New Zealand landscape painter the Matukituki area could keep me busy for years. Here is a South Island alpine landscape with an added dimension…the colour green!

A trip to the Matukituki Valley begins at Wanaka via Mt Aspiring Road. The road gradually deteriorates from seal to gravel…it narrows as it parallels the Matukituki River, then crosses eight fords that seem to become deeper each time until finally the road terminates at the Raspberry Flat car park. Tramps into Mt Aspiring National Park often begin from Raspberry Flat. I understand that parties sometimes walk out through here after an ascent on Mt Aspiring, the “glistening mountain”.

This oil painting depicts the landscape on the way into Raspberry Flat. The Matukituki captured my attention long before we reached our destination, which was Cascade Hut at the far point of our walk through the Matukituki Valley. To be precise, this oil painting is based on the landscape immediately passed the first ford, looking back toward Wanaka.

In the Matukituki the landscape seems to possess everything. Snow-covered mountain peaks wherever you look, a crystal clear river running over a stony bottom, bushland in abundance…and the promise of views of Mt Aspiring / Tititea.

The oil painting is crisp and clean in style and I think it reflects atmosphere of the Matukituki valley. There are many different visual textures within the work, which I think adds complexity to this painting. There is a high level of detail in the oil painting and the art prints; in fact, many more hours of work went into painting the original oil than I had initially counted on. The result is worthwhile however, and I am pleased to offer a very small run of 450 hand signed and numbered limited edition art prints on paper and only up to 195 Giclee fine art prints on canvas.

Original painting 'The Matukituki': oil on canvas
Original painting size: 1200mm x 800mm.

Private collection, Tauranga, N.Z.

Art prints: Limited edition (offset on paper) 450, hand numbered & signed. Large size: (image area) 726mm x 481mm
Print price (printed offset on paper unframed) NZ $99 + packaging and freight. (Packaging & freight is free within NZ.) See below for exchange rates

Giclee reproductions: Limited to a maximum of 195 renditions of this work.
Giclee fine art prints on canvas (unframed) NZ $499+ packaging & freight outside NZ. (Packaging & freight is free within NZ.) More about Giclee fine art prints