From the Sidelines

In club rugby there are characters, real characters. The type of men and women who make a community what it is. There are whole families, sometimes three generations, involved in the game they love – Gregor Paul, For the Love of the Game.

Opening September 27 at Creative Tauranga, From the Sidelines, is a visually stunning exhibition that captures and celebrates Bay rugby through the lens of award winning local photographer Mark McKeown and selected artifacts from the Tauranga Heritage Collection.

A previous winner of the New Zealand Sports Photographer of the Year award and recent recipient the NZIPP Master of Photography, Mark focuses his camera on the fans and supporters of local rugby. “Working as a photographer for the Bay of Plenty Times it’s about capturing the exciting moments on the field. For this exhibition the challenge has been to point my camera beyond the try line and record moments in the crowd that are far less rehearsed.”

As part of the exhibition a rugby club room will feature historical photographs and other club memorabilia, recreating where rugby player and supporter meet after the whistle has blown. Also on display will be the only known surviving Tauranga Rugby Union Cap, of its age, which was owned by Charlie Haua. Charlie was the first captain of the Cadet Old Boy’s Rugby Football Club and represented the Bay of Plenty in 1929.

A special dimension of the collaboration between Mark and the Tauranga Heritage Collection is the creation of a photographic archive. “It’s such a significant year for New Zealand rugby and I hope that in years to come my photographs will be of interest to people who wonder what was happening with rugby in Tauranga in 2011’.

The exhibition will run from 27 September to 17 October at the Tauranga Community Gallery, Creative Tauranga, 112 Willow Street.