Age Concern Wellington art exhibition

Greetings, Kia Ora, Kia Orana, Fakalofa Lahi Atu, Taloha Ni

The chair of Age Concern Wellington, Dr Margaret Guthrie; the co-ordinator of the visiting service, and of this project, Jan Owen; curator Lucy Moore; the four Wellington artists whose work is featured in this exhibition - Anne Munz, Avis Higgs, Sir Michael Fowler, back home here, and Michael Nicholson; Hon Ruth Dyson, Minister of Social Development and Employment and Minister for Senior Citizens;  Distinguished Guests, Ladies and Gentlemen, my greetings to you all.

I am delighted to be with you this evening to launch the Open Eyes, Open Minds exhibition as the Patron of Age Concern Wellington.

Seeing these wonderful art works makes us feel inspired which is the very purpose of this exhibition.

James K Baxter said that our spirit:   "blows like the wind in a thousand paddocks / inside and outside the fences."

Wherever we are on our journey through life, we can pick up the tools and the joy of creativity and fashion something to express our own spirit.

Although the work you produce might never be shown in a gallery or win admiration from the critics, that's not the point.

Expressing your life, your experiences and insights through painting or creating an object that communicates to others is liberating and uplifting.

The English writer GK Chesterton had a lovely thing to say about creativity. He wrote: "At the back of our mind [exists] a forgotten blaze or burst of astonishment at our own existence.  The object of the artistic and spiritual life is to dig for this submerged sunrise of wonder."

This exhibition challenges us all to keep digging.

We all have threads that have come right through our lives. We all undergo that process of casting off the weaker elements, the things that don't work for us, and building on our strengths.

I would like to congratulate Age Concern Wellington on Open Eyes, Open Minds.

I would like to thank Jan Owen, who runs Age Concern Wellington's Visiting Service, for coming up with the idea. I believe that she did so while visiting an elderly woman, who had produced a work of art.  Jan wants to enable others to follow suit.

I would also like to thank the curator, Lucy Moore.  This exhibition requires expert balance and placement of the pieces.

And I would like to take this opportunity to pay tribute to Dr Margaret Guthrie, a woman who could be described as a retired gerontologist - but won't be!

I understand that Margaret has famously declared, 'I have never retired.  My life is seamless."

While Open Eyes, Open Minds is about inspiring creativity, it is also about that kind of seamlessness.

What is really at the heart of this exhibition is the on-going expression of the essence of us as human beings.

And that is, in fact, at the heart of all the work done by Age Concern Wellington.  As the organisation's Patron, it gives me great pride to declare this exhibition officially open.

Tena koutou, kia ora, kia kaha, tena koutou katoa