Ascot Encaustic Art Gallery - Tuition & Supplies

Welcome to www.encausticart.co.nz where encaustic art has a home in the South Island of New Zealand.

On December 23rd 2007 some 40 people attended the launch of Ascot Gallery, featuring encaustic artworks produced on site by Lynn Whitford. The Nelson encaustic art gallery is situated at Ascot Lodge Motel, 69 Golf Road, Tahunanui, Nelson, New Zealand.

Believed to be the only specialist encaustic art gallery in New Zealand, Ascot Gallery is now proud to be offering Tutorial Workshops along with Art Supplies making encaustic art part of the Nelson environment.

Those attending the opening of the gallery were entranced watching Lynn give a simple demonstration of her skills producing a picture from coloured waxes melted onto the base of an iron then spread onto a sealed card, finally adding some finer touches with a smaller heated implement.

For most this was their first experience of one of the world's most ancient painting mediums dating back some 2,500 years to Greco-Roman Egypt, where coloured wax was burnt into absorbent materials such as plaster, canvas and wood.

Having become virtually a lost art form by the end of the 12th century, encaustic art saw a revival in the 20th century with the advent of easy methods of heating the wax, such as the electric iron.

Lynn has been working with encaustic art now for some 8 years since discovering it while living in England. While many of her early works had a distinct UK influence, her more recent works have started to develop a strong New Zealand feel, especially those featuring New Zealand flax, cabbage trees and pohutukawa, but also her larger landscape works and beach scenes.

Expansion plans are currently underway to enlarge the gallery space so as to allow the possibility of exhibiting work by other local encaustic artists who have passed through the Ascot Encaustic Art Tutorials and are now starting to develop their own individual styles.

If you would like to know more about the world of encaustic, please contact us at lynnzart@ascotlodge.co.nz for further information.