In 1981, a New Zealand artist, the late Bill Luff, came to PNG to work on a two year contract for the PNG government. The two years eventually extended into a highly successful 10 years in Port Moresby where Luff, an accomplished watercolour painter, captured an interesting array of subjects with the brush and mounted six exhibitions. Luff returned home to New Zealand and in 2005 published a book about his experiences in New Zealand, PNG and South East Asia. A selection of his best paintings also adorn the pages of the book titled: Bill Luff New Zealand Watercolourist and Art Director.
When viewing Luff’s collection of paintings in the book, one cannot help but notice a feature that stands out in all his works - his tenacious attention to details. While one may argue that artists are supposed to pay attention to details, he seems to have gone after subjects that are extremely rich in details. And that did not only include busy streets scenes and market places, but also individuals and groups of people.
Luff came to PNG in 1981 to take up a job as Chief Designer with the then Office of Information at Konedobu in PNG. While he does not say why he chose to come to PNG, it was certainly an inspiring decision for him to be able to work amongst different cultures that provided rich new subjects for his paint brush.
Luff says he initially came on a two-year contract but did not leave the country until 1990. Soon after he arrived there was a successful vote of no confidence against the Somare government and Sir Julius became the prime minister.
Luff writes: “Chan, after a couple of years, closed the ‘Office’ thus terminating all but a few expatriate contracts. Luckily, because I was enjoying much of the Port Moresby lifestyle I was retained to work largely with the PNG Government Printing office.”
Luff was able to mount six successful exhibitions of watercolour paintings in Papua New Guinea and he attributed the success largely to the ‘remarkable variety of subjects.’
“The clothing, habitat and physical characteristics of the nineteen provinces provided me with endless challenges. Port Moresby as capital city had people from all over Papua New Guinea”.
Ironically, Luff recalls that when he first arrived in PNG, he was advised to paint Papua New Guineans in all their traditional regalia.
“As exciting as the masks and decorations looked I did not take this advice”.
Port Moresby provided Luff with most of the subjects and scenery he needed for his paintings. Hanuabada or the Big Village was one subject that really challenged him and he seemed to have relished for it drew the best out of him. The village built on stilts that extended out into the shallows of the Fairfax harbour with a magnificent skyline of the modern Port Moresby high rises in the background, offered a maze of details and slight shades of colours. The scene is a paradise for photographers at anytime but for a painter, even of Luff’s class, it was a daunting task. Yet in his work Morning Reflections, Luff rose to the occasion to capture the village in all its glory at sunrise.
“The subject proved to be one of my most successful in Port Moresby,” Luff writes. “Although Moresby can have breezes and a few strong winds this was on a typically still early morning”.
Luff’s fascination with the Big Village continued with several close-up works and another magnificent painting is Old Canoe, Rusty Roofs and Washing - which is exactly that! The work captures a part of the Big Village which is so realistic, especially the rusting roofs, that one can almost feel the rust in the painting!
The famous Koki Market in Port Moresby also provided the detailed crowd scenes which he loved. Luff picked out bananas, the major food crop in the Central Province and the numerous varieties of them that were displayed and sold at Koki. His eye for detail is sharp yet he says what he assumed to be a bilum full of coconuts actually turned out to be a baby! Koki is also on the water front and the fish market there provided an added variety of sea food subjects.
From crowds to individuals, Luff demonstrates his growing knowledge of identifying the different ethnic groups in PNG and the characteristic traits that make them differ. After some years in PNG, one can generally identify which provinces people are from by their physical appearance and/or by the language or way they speak. His painting titled Polka dots because of the dotted dress worn by one of the subjects, demonstrates his ability to capture the different ethnic groups in Papua New Guinea. In the painting, two women are scouring for shellfish along Ela Beach and just by looking at the picture, one can already workout where each one comes from. The darker woman is from Western and the woman of lighter complexion is from Gulf which are neighbouring provinces yet they look so different!
His book also features a selection of his portrayal of individual Papua New Guineans from mothers, babies, children, to colourful laplaps, meri blouses, bilums, tongs and umbrellas. Again the details that he captures are amazing.
Luff’s ability to handle details is probably best demonstrated, I believe, in his paintings of the famous coconut palms. Coconuts have been one of the most painted subjects in PNG and the palms give the ‘tropical’ look which is usually associated with PNG and the Pacific islands. The physical feature of the palm with its slim trunk, arching fronds, hanging leaves and piles of nuts have been a favourite subject of all budding artists from elementary schools to art colleges. Luff’s ability to capture this majestic palm is exceptional and worthy of study by aspiring artists. An example of his skills is demonstrated in the painting Oro Bay in which the different shades of palms provide the frame for this picturesque bay.
Of course, when painters publish their works in a book, they take the risk that their paintings will not be represented exactly as the original work. Equally, for a printer it is a nightmare trying to capture all shades of colours that are present in a painting. This is often not possible so some of Luff’s paintings appearing in his book may not be a true representation of the original colours as he had captured.
The painting that I believe best presents Luff’s mastery with details is the one that won and international award in London. It is titled Pagoda Street, Singapore which presents an intricate maze of colour and details of life along that street. Singapore, like many Asian cities and communities, provide painters with ideal subjects for their work.
Bill Luff New Zealand Watercolourist and Art Director is available from New Zealand’s Art Centre Bookshop and can be ordered through New Zealand Book Online on website: http://www.booksnz.com/
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