It was an exquisite day. It was one of those days so clear so still, so silent you almost feel the earth itself has stopped in astonishment at its own beauty.

The Katherine Mansfield Notebooks, Volume Two, p. 349.  Katherine Mansfield reflecting on the Marlborough Sounds.

We have had day after day of summer weather. Now I am hoping for rain for the garden’s sake. I’m sure plants prefer rain water to chlorinated water issuing from a garden hose.  

   On Saturday (9 February), I went to the Katherine Mansfield Birthplace with a friend from Christchurch (a Katherine Mansfield fan), to see the exhibition ‘The Painted Word’. Paintings and jewellery and wall mounted sculptures were on display in the upstairs art gallery as well as in several rooms in the house. My favourite item was Reverie by Seraphine Pick, a magical painting in the surrealist style with images taken from Katherine Mansfield’s life, some of herself, her husband and her friends.

    Now going back to the first day of the Katherine Mansfield Conference which I began writing about last time. Chris Price talked about her residency in Menton where she was working on a book. She kept a journal which she read extracts from. She said she often wrote this from observations made while walking to the residency from the apartment where she lived.

   Emily Perkins, newly appointed lecturer at the Institute of Modern Letters at Victoria University in Wellington, looked at texture and word choice in Mansfield’s stories. She posed useful questions for writers to consider when they are reading the work of others such as: ‘How does a writer do things on the page’, and ‘What are the writerly choices being made’.  She also asked ‘How much is a narrative about change’, and ‘Show not tell, where are the limits? ‘How do you get the balance when you're writing, not too much description, and yet enough?’

   It was difficult to choose what to go to in the parallel sessions in the afternoon. I have already mentioned Virginia King’s talk and equally enjoyable was the session with Penelope Jackson, Director of the Tauranga Art Gallery. She showed a variety of paintings about Katherine Mansfield in her power point lecture. My favourite was the oil on canvas portrait by Anne Estelle Rice now in the art collection held by the Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa in Wellington. I have a framed poster in the hallway. Another by Beatrice Campbell Katherine Mansfield and S S Koteliansky is also located at Te Papa. Another interesting painting was a work by Nigel Brown. Interestingly there is an exhibition of his work currently on show at the Diversion Gallery in Picton. I love his use of vibrant colour and his commentary on NZ culture. Apparently he based the portrait of Katherine Mansfield on his mother, a small woman with a similar hairstyle. Another work was by Susan Wilson, an artist based in London who did a series of illustrations of Mansfield’s stories for an edition published by the Folio Society.

   This talk was followed by Nicola Saker who had curated an exhibition, 'Behind the Mask', at the Katherine Mansfield Birthplace in 2011 (7 September to 30 November). This exhibition showed paintings and drawings done during Katherine Mansfield’s lifetime. Nicola commented that the Anne Estelle Rice portrait had a ‘defiant yet wary stillness’. Penelope Jackson had previously commented on the brick red crimson colour of the dress and a possible reference to the tuberculosis that finally killed her. There was a caricature of Katherine Mansfield done by George Banks which appeared in Rhythm, a pencil drawing by Gaudier Brzeska and a large piece by the artist Dorothy Brett, a friend of both Katherine Mansfield and John Middleton Murry. An image by A S Hartrick called ‘Lilac Time’ refused to be cajoled from its place in the slide sequence.

   The first day of the conference ended with a reception at the Alexander Turnbull Library noted on in my last blog.

   An interview with Dr Gerri Kimber, Katherine Mansfield Society Chair, on her recent discoveries of new Katherine Mansfield material purchased by the Alexander Turnbull Library in Wellington can be heard on the Radio NZ National website.

www.radionz.co.nz/national/programmes/artsonsunday

   Next time: Ship Cove trip. I’ve written the outline but it would make this blog too long I think. Also the final decision on the proposed salmon farms in the Marlborough Sounds and a report on ‘Writing Home’ the poetry evening this Friday 5.30-7pm with NZ Poet Laureate, Ian Wedde (born in Blenheim), Cliff Fell (Nelson poet), Dinah Hawken (lives in Paekakariki), and John Newton (born in Blenheim, lives on Waiheke Island). We are fortunate to have this literary event. Entry is by koha.  I hope it’s well attended.