Culture of New Zealand - Arts

Arts

New Zealand has two 'high cultural' traditions: Māori and Western. However most cultural material consumed in New Zealand is imported from overseas, particularly from Britain and the United States. Because of this and New Zealand's small population, most New Zealand artists, performers and writers struggle to make a living from their art. Some funding for the arts is provided through a specific arts based government department, Creative New Zealand. The New Zealand Historic Places Trust and the Ministry for Culture and Heritage are national bodies that assist with heritage preservation. Most towns and cities have museums and often art galleries, and the national museum and art gallery is Te Papa ('Our Place'), in Wellington.

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Famous quotes containing the word arts:

    In a very ugly and sensible age, the arts borrow, not from life, but from each other.
    Oscar Wilde (1854–1900)

    As far as the arts and the sciences are concerned, the German mind appreciates most highly that which it does not understand of the latter, and that which it does not enjoy of the former.
    Franz Grillparzer (1791–1872)

    Women hock their jewels and their husbands’ insurance policies to acquire an unaccustomed shade in hair or crêpe de chine. Why then is it that when anyone commits anything novel in the arts he should be always greeted by this same peevish howl of pain and surprise? One is led to suspect that the interest people show in these much talked of commodities, painting, music, and writing, cannot be very deep or very genuine when they so wince under an unexpected impact.
    John Dos Passos (1896–1970)