1. Gibbs Farm where an Anish Kapoor sculpture peeks out
of the meadow, horn of plenty invites exploration
Photo courtesy Gibbs Farm
NZTODAY Helensville
48 NZTODAY ISSUE 61 ISSUE 61 NZTODAY 49
Auckland
Helensville
-36.680025, 174.449290
Historic Helensville is well worth a daytrip or twin coast detour
A
n aerial view of historic Helensville resembles
the title page of East Enders; more than a
century ago the Kaipara region was on the map
as Kairi harbour and gumdiggers El Dorado
complete with river boat trips and spa retreats.
These days its landscape hides sculpture parks,
pioneer collections, a gannet colony and the
New Zealand skydiving school. For the day-tripping window
shoppers and foodies, the cafes and treasure shops alone are
worth a detour.
Follow the footsteps of our PM, the Helensville MP and
discover the scenery seen from sea, from the air, from the river
or by train.
at 40 minutes’ drive from Auckland
Parallel worlds discovered
Story
Monica Louis
Photos
Maurice Louis

2. ISSUE 61 NZTODAY 51
NZTODAY Helensville
height into the air for no apparent reason. In a pond a brick
Loch Ness monster seemed to be frolicking just above water
level and from the angle where we were standing, one of the
sculptures looked like Casper the friendly ghost, poking his
white sheet head over a hill top.
With a bit of asking-around, we discovered that we had
been traveling past Gibbs Farm, a world famous sculpture
park featuring mainly abstract art by world famous sculptors
from New Zealand and abroad. The farm does have open
days in spring, summer and autumn but when we tried to
make contact, we soon found out those days are booked solid
and we had to accept that only a lucky few may find their way
past the gates.
But the moment had worked its magic and Maurice and
I spent a few hours exploring the surrounding area for good
angles to take photographs. We decided there and then that
we had to come back and that sentiment deepened when we
strolled though Helensville and met with John Perry who was
packing up displays outside his ‘Global Village Empire’ about
which I’ll tell you more later.
NZTODAY editor Sarah was made enthusiastic by my
babbling on about real magic and twin realities and hence we
returned some weeks later to delve into the heart of historic
Helensville.
Historic homesteads and
War Memorials
Keeping in mind that this
edition of NZTODAY
is dedicated to the
commemoration of the
ANZAC landings in the
Gallipoli Peninsula 100
years ago, we make a
point of stopping at the
War Memorial Hall which
is housed in the same
complex as the Helensville
library on the main
shopping street. In the
Library I find some books
on Helensville history
and learn that the name
Do you ever get the feeling there may be parallel worlds
existing side by side to ours in a different dimension?
It is a fantasy that highly appealed to me in grammar school,
when I read a Jean Paul Sartre novel titled ‘The chips are
down’ for the French literature assignment; it’s the story of
a man and a women who were destined to be soulmates
but they only meet in the afterlife due to a bureaucratic
error made in heaven. They are given the chance to return
to the world and have a second go at fulfilling their destiny.
For weeks I was in the mood of the book and searched for
reflections of silhouettes in shop windows hoping to catch
glimpses of kindred spirits from ‘the other side’, quixotic
energy pumping in my veins.
Recently, I had that same sensation hit me like a deja-vu.
Maurice and I were travelling south from the
Northland Peninsula and decided to detour
via State Highway 16 to suss out the other
side of the twin coast discovery highway.
Half dreaming and with my eyes on the
horizon, close to Kaukapakapa just north of
Helensville, I spotted a bigger-than-life giraffe
grazing in some broad, well-maintained
rolling meadows.
I saw that Maurice had noticed it too
and we had to pinch ourselves, happy to be
travelling together because, for a moment, we
both thought we were losing a few marbles.
A little further, a giant red horn of plenty
was half buried in the landscape, both ends
sticking out urging an invitation to wander in
and explore its underground chambers. Next,
a water organ was spitting fountains of varied
Two giraffes but who is the impostor? Jeff Thomson corrugated giraffe with mate, spot the difference… Photo: Rory Thomson
Casper the friendly ghost, or more correctly Neil Dawson’s
sculpture “horizons” Photo courtesy Gibbs Farm
A rare Loch Ness
monstersightingnorth
of Helensville Photo
courtesy Gibbs Farm
Helensville comes from the villa John McLeod built for his
wife Helen in the 1860s. The McLeod brothers John and
Isaac, were early settlers who had come from Nova Scotia to
New Zealand and who built the first Kauri sawmill on the
Kaipara harbour.
I also learn that there is a war memorial cemetery and
statue as well as the war memorial hall and I head out to find
these while Maurice scouts the streets to shoot some first
impression photos.
Studying a plaque with the names of Helensville citizens
who were amongst
the fallen soldiers,
victims of the ‘great’
wars, brings home the
ANZAC Day meaning
to me; here, engraved
in the copper plate
are the names of E.W.
McLeod – Official
Number number
412945 and 32434
D.C. McLeod , two
of the casualties of
WW2. Real people,
real descendants
from Helensville’s founding fathers! I ponder the far reaching
effects of war; a small town in New Zealand probably seeing
most of it’s able bodied young men marching off to a battle
at the other side of the planet; maybe they fought in Egypt,
Tunisia or Italy.
The Helensville War Memorial
Hall, statue and cemetery
remembering ANZAC
Pioneer Helensville started with the
McLeod brothers-and at every occasion
the town dresses up

3. NZTODAY Helensville
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Before moving to New Zealand I had visited Monte
Cassino, south of Rome. It is the site of an ancient monastery
where the order of St Benedict was founded in the early
Middle-Ages; I had been to the abbey when I was living and
working in Italy. But it wasn’t until 2010 when my friend,
Margerita Giampietri from Whitianga, was selected as one of
the artists for the Legato Exhibition that was held in Cassino
that year, that I learned of the connection of the Italian town
with the second New Zealand division in WW2. I wonder
if this is where one of the McLeods lost his life in the futile
attempt to break through the German’s Gustav line.
During my visits to the war memorials, Maurice
discovered the Railway Museum and the Ginger Crunch
Café. So we opted for brunch at the Ginger Crunch and I can
recommend their crunch-cookies as the perfect comfort food
after all my serious ANZAC musing.
After lunch, I succeeded in persuading Maurice to check
out the hot mineral pools at Parakai. In pre-European times,
when Helensville was known to Maori as Awaroa, the hot
springs were known and already valued for their healing
qualities. Originally they were natural mud pools in the
plains but in the 1920s, the Helensville domain was known
far and wide as a regular hotspot for Spa visitors and there
were times when the boarding houses couldn’t cope with the
demand from tourists coming to soak in the healing waters.
These days, there are several pools to choose from; the
municipal hot-pools in the Parakai domain have large public
pools and are a favourite for families thanks to the giant
water slides. Opposite the public pools, Palm Springs Spa has
recently refurbished and the upmarket Parakai Spring Lodge
and Spa uses the natural mineral water to supply their pool
and Jacuzzi. I deeply regret not having more time because I
would have loved a soak, but duty calls.
Parakai, which is simply Kaipara switched around a bit,
also has an airport and I had made an appointment to meet
Fiona McLaren the manager of New Zealand’s only skydiving
school where in under a year you can get your diploma in
commercial sky diving. Housed in the same venue as the
Auckland Sky Diving Company, the school is the only place
in New Zealand where you can learn to become a qualified
DZ Operator (drop zone) and there are plans to school
skydiving instructors in the future. For that you need more
than 700 jumps!
In New Zealand today, skydiving is a popular adventure
activity and booming tourism business but if you want
to jump without an instructor, you need a licence. It
isn’t surprising that there are stringent health and safety
regulations governing sport and recreational skydiving.
For your basic licence, you need a minimum of 25 jumps
including consolidation jumps under the guidance of an
instructor, before being allowed to go it alone. After that,
you can make your own jump plan and be
unaccompanied at any DZs but you do need to
become a member of a parachuting organisation.
There are several DZs in New Zealand, but I
was surprised to hear this is the only school in
preparing for a commercial skydiving diploma.
The popular 32-week full time course includes
200 jumps, as well as modules about freefall
camera and video operation, spotting, accuracy,
and meteorology as well as a business model on
how to operate a DZ.
Fiona got her licence in the UK and
worked all over the world in skydiving. Before moving to
Parakai, she was in Taupo and Motueka. There are about
10 permanent staff in the school of whom six are jump staff
and the atmosphere with the team is cool and laid-back – an
ambiance symbolised by the large bean bags on the lookout
deck from where one can leisurely watch the multi-coloured
parcels drop from the big blue. I guess this is another bucket
list item; learn how to freefall.
Cool down in cool bean bags before or after jumping
Parakai Helensville in the distance
Fiona McLaren, not related to the racing car driver
Parakai Spring Lodge hot pool
An ambiance symbolised by the large bean bags on the
lookout deck from where one can leisurely watch the multi-
coloured parcels drop from the big blue.
Mineral springs and New
Zealand’s Skydiving School

4. ISSUE 61 NZTODAY 55
Trash art and collector’s chaos
Maurice and I both have a bucket list as long as Auckland’s
A to Z but let’s not complain; better to die in the middle of
learning something new, rather than to be found seated in an
armchair waiting for the days to turn over.
On the top of Maurice’s list, is learning to sculpt with
trash. In the South of France where he grew up, there is
an art movement sometimes referred to as l’Ecole de Nice.
These artists wanted to bring down the boundaries of art
as untouchable museum pieces validated by experts and
instead, create a direct connection between the spectator
and the artist. Ben, Niki de Saint Phalle and her husband
Jean Tingley and Cesar Baldacinni can be said to fit in this
movement. (If you’re interested Google them and l’ecole
de Nice and Fluxus) Maurice greatly admires
Cesar whom he met. Cesar sculptures are often
made from scrap metal or polyurethane creating
destructively figurative images from crushed
cutlery or cars or melted foam turds.
While roaming through Helenville’s streets
Maurice spotted the plaque outside Kiwi sculptor
Jeff Thomson’s studio and peaking over the
fence he became an instant fan. Jeff Thomson
is probably best known to most of us for the
Taihape gumboot or for his corrugated-iron ’73
HQ Holden, now in the permanent collection
of Te Papa. Jeff would fit in the Ecole de Nice
just like that (to quote Tommy Cooper) not least
because he is utterly approachable and easily
agrees to meet us for a tour of his workplace.
And there it is again; the parallel-worlds
phenomena; as soon as I’ve set foot inside the gate
I feel like the child who wants to move in with her best friend’s
family because their home feels so much more like the place
where she belongs.
Jeff’s wife Shona welcomes us in what could be called the
antechamber, a room the size of a large alcove with a wall
filled to the ceiling with beautiful bent metal objects. The front
courtyard has a little patch, like a corrugated iron version of
LEGOLAND, assembling a deckchair, cactus, various trees and
giant bird topiary, all made from iron, woven, patched, stacked,
braided, moulded, curled or stringed and mingling with live
greenery to melt into a fantasy world.
The sun shines and I would happily have taken a book from the
library and nestled in the deckchair with a corrugated cocktail
and waste some time …
Corrugated rubber
Photo: Rory Thomson
Jeff and Shona

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Jeff’s story is fascinating – creative talents discovered and
nurtured early on during high school, yet for a year or so he
drops out of ELAM art school, searching for a direction and
he initially strands up in Dunedin. Here solitary weekdays
are alternated with weekends hanging out with a mate after
walking four hours into town and walking back to solitude after
the weekend. Those walks are the start for longer walks, the
first one being a 13 day stretch from Dunedin to Christchurch.
I imagine Jeff, like a Hansel without Gretel wandering
through New Zealand’s countryside in order to find himself
which, of course, he does. On his path he finds ‘roadside
jewellery’ – beads, tin caps and pieces of coloured metal which
become one of the inspirations for his personal aesthetics.
Road signs, post boxes, typography on advertising boards; he
records, draws and photographs what he saw, and he started
dropping marketing flyers in the post boxes of farms offering
to create personalised artwork for them. Working with
corrugated iron dates from this period, post boxes decorations
and small objects, and to this day he is in his own words still
discovering new ways of making the material speak. His
commitment goes from sourcing curving rollers to do his
own corrugating to painting and decorating the material with
his own screen prints – which were in fact the two primary
disciplines from his time at ELAM School of Fine Arts
(painting and printmaking rather than sculpture)
Jeff did return to ELAM after his wandering, followed by
awards and scholarships and artist in residence fellowships.
And more travel. He went overseas for months at a time and
we discover he spent time not far from where I was born in
Holland. Family circumstances brought him back to his father’s
farm in Kaukapakapa, near Helensville which is not that far
from Castor Bay, North Shore where he grew up. In 2013, the
Tauranga Art Gallery published a catalogue/textbook on the
occasion of an exhibition which is presently still travelling New
Zealand; Corrugations – the art of Jeff Thomson. The book is
well worth having and still available for ordering online from
the gallery.
While Jeff, Shona and I chat, Maurice snoops around like a
kid in a lolly jar – the huge shed is stocked like a hoarder’s den
with numerous collections, toys, masks, a large jar of roadside
jewellery and the muchness is almost hiding the Jeff’s many
works of art the way trees are hidden by the forest. We meet his
loyal assistant, recognise the style of the new Helensville public
toilets in the big water tanks in the back yard and are tempted
to enquire about the price of a smaller one which doubles as a
corrugated fish tank complete with goldfish swimming past the
portholes. We have to leave feeling wanting more but in awe
of the sheer undeniable talent. And guess what; the giraffe on
Gibbs Farm is an original Jeff Thomson.
Jeff has to get to work on his installation for the opening
next week of Waiheke Island Sculpture on the Gulf and we are
meeting next with John Perry, a colourful character who really
merits a story all by himself.
Director of the Bathhouse, Rotorua’s art and history
museum for 20 years, curator, private and professional
collector and now proprietor of Global Village, John greets us
on the doorsteps of the former Regent Cinema turned antique
shop. He is just packing up the outdoor displays for the day.
We have an appointment with John Perry whose Global Village Antiques
reside in the former Regent Cinema
Nature and man made garden - woven, moulded, shredded or twisted iron
Helensville public toilet – a Jeff Thomson original and inside a Jeff Thomson water tank
Early work -
Holden, Post
box art
Photos courtesy
Rory Thomson

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We are invited up for a cuppa tea on the balcony and on
our way upstairs John explains that his life is an ongoing
fight between chaos and structure, which is immediately
illustrated as we squeeze our way past objects of beauty
waiting for their 15 minutes of fame.
Artist, gallerist and style inspiration for others, he really
is the quintessential collector and he himself is quick to
bring up the question of the fine line between hoarder
and collector. We find we share a passion for naïve art also
called folk art and John can’t wait to take us up the ladder
John’s treasures are sought after by collectors of cinema memerobelia
flyers in the mail box will be worth
collecting. Just like matchboxes and
postcards they represent our era
and everyone throws them in the
trash. Two generations[40-50 years]
from now they will become valuable
and looked upon with wonder and
amazement.
Shipwrecks and Kauri mills
For a small town, it is amazing that
there is a pioneer museum as well
as a railway museum housed in the
railway station. Helensville is proud
of its history and many volunteers
help to keep memories alive.
Early European settlement in
the area was lured by the prospect
of prosperity; the Kaipara harbour
seemed to offer an easy entrance to
the Kaipara River winding into the
hinterland. The shores were lined
by tall Kauri trees, valuable material
for ship’s masts and other repairs. In those early days, easy
access to waterways would have been what the M1 is now;
in 1845 Ernest Dieffenbach, a surveyor for the Wakefield
Land Company described the area as a potential place where
labour and capital may be profitably employed (from - Tall
spars, steamers & gum by Wayne Ryburn) – but when
Maurice and I meet with the volunteers at the Helensville
Pioneer Museum, we soon learn that the harbour is littered
with many shipwrecks. A big map
shows their position.
The museum houses several
collections illustrating the history
of the milling period, with a
recently added shed full of tools
and bush memorabilia. There is of
course ample information about
the founding families, about gum
diggers and the harbour and the
railway allowing development of
the dairy industry. The annual
A&P show held the last Saturday in
February is still going strong, 115
years since it was inaugurated.
These days, Auckland day-
trippers find their way to Helensville
to do a spot of shopping, maybe
take a boat trip from Riverhead,
visit the gannet Colony at Muriwai
or simply enjoy a Sunday brunch.
The iSite is a quirky meeting point
–part café, part bookshop, part art
gallery and a place for WiFi access. Maurice and I have last
refreshment there before setting off for the other twin of the
Twin Coasts.
It was a complete eye-opener and I am reminded of
a favourite quote by former UN Secretary-General, Dag
Hammarskjold; only he who keeps his eyes fixed on the far
horizon will find the right way. Well … off the highway we
certainly found a new byway.
to where one of his latest groupings has just returned from
an expo called ‘Outsider Art’ – the folk art of New Zealand.
Turns out John is quite an expert for Pacific folk art which
also includes tribal art from the islands, Maori art and work
done by the early pioneers who were not schooled artists
but all the same they captured the impressions of their
environment like a Paul Gauguin or a Vincent van Gogh.
John shows us his collection of movie memorabilia which
includes posters, magazines and tickets and shares his tip
for budding collectors; I predict that the free advertising
Objects of
beauty waiting
for a collector
The museum is a work of love for the
many volunteers