Post researched and written by Amanda Mills, Curator Music and AV Collections October 2022 marked 50 years since the formation of Split Enz, one of the most significant bands to emerge from New Zealand, and one which launched the careers of Tim and Neil Finn, Phil Judd, Noel Crombie, and Eddie Rayner. Before the ‘Enz’, […]

Post cooked up by Emma Scott, Collections Assistant – Publications My Hocken colleagues are sick of hearing about my love for the air fryer. My air fryer has been moved out of the cupboard and has a permanent home on the kitchen bench. This move is significant as it could have easily been banished to […]

Post written by Collections Assistant – Publications, Gini Jory  ‘The year is 1926, and Shanghai hums to the tune of debauchery.’ In this 1920s retelling of Shakespeare’s classic Romeo and Juliet, a blood feud between two rival gangs that has been going on for generations has swept Shanghai into chaos. The Scarlets, with their newly […]

Post cooked up by Jen Anderson, Collections Assistant – Publications People who work with heritage material often find themselves compelled to demonstrate its relevance to contemporary society. Some connections are obvious, and some require a little more lateral thinking. Initially I intended to justify this carrot-themed post via the Easter bunny, but having tasted the […]

Post researched and written by Amanda Mills. Curator Music and AV, and Katherine Milburn, Curator Ephemera. Kaleidoscope World: 40 Years of Flying Nun in Dunedin explores the Flying Nun scene in Dunedin – from the early origins with The Enemy through to the contemporary local music scene which looks beyond Flying Nun. The exhibition pulls […]

Currently there is world-wide interest in the song “Soon May The Wellerman Come”. Social media is simply heaving with shanty mania. There is of course a Dunedin connection and a recent article in the Otago Daily Times explains the history of the Weller Brothers shore whaling station at Ōtākou and a little bit of background […]

Post researched and written by Curator of Photographs Anna Petersen Illumination is a topical subject in Dunedin at present as the City Council continues to roll out the new LED lights, designed to cut down on energy consumption and enhance our night sky.  As we also enter the season of light, it seems a good […]

Post researched and written by Curator of Photographs Anna Petersen The Geoff Adams collection of slides, prints and negatives in the Hocken Photographs Collection stand out for their colourful, rather racy nature.  Predominantly portraits of actors, artists, singers, TV broadcasters, dancers and sportsmen, they were all taken in London during the mid-1960s and tell of […]

Post researched and written by HUMS 301 intern Kayli Taylor. How power (im)balances mean minorities are not adequately represented, including in archives. Gordon Spittle’s Beat Groups and courtyard parties provides a broad snapshot of the underground culture of the Ōtepoti Dunedin music scene in the 1960s. The book offers a raw depiction of collectives of […]

Post cooked up by Katherine Milburn, Liaison Librarian and Curator of Ephemera There was never going to be a problem deciding which of Hocken’s amazing collections to use when it came to my turn for ‘Stirring up the stacks’ – it had to be Ephemera hands down! But the major dilemma was choosing from the […]