Gordon Walters

Gordon Walters

Although better known as a painter, artist Gordon Walters (1919-1995) also worked as a graphic designer, and his work in this area provided him both with space for experimentation, and a wide audience for his work. This striking 1972 cover for the School Journal  features the elongated spiral motif he developed in a number of works on paper in the mid 1960s.

Walters' formal training was in commercial art. In 1983 he recalled his time studying in the late 1930s:

I was supposed to be at art school to prepare myself for a career in commercial art and I did in fact enjoy design work very much, but I rapidly became much more interested in painting. At the time I was puzzled by the distinctions made between the fine and the applied arts. I wondered why the excellence of some graphic designers was considered to be of a lesser order than that of painters who were mediocre. I was a great admirer of poster designers such as E. McKnight Kaufer and A. M. Cassandre. But after my first experiences of having to work to order, the marvellous freedom of the fine artist won out over the restraints imposed on the commercial artist.

Despite these reservations, Walters had a long career as a designer, working largely for various government departments and organisations. For 10 years from 1954 he worked at the Government Printing Office. In the 1960s he became involved with Te Ao Hou: A New World, a magazine published by the Department of Māori Affairs that covered news and affairs of interest to a Māori audience.

In 1966 Walters began painting full-time. However, for the next 15 years he continued to contribute cover work for various publications, including Ascent, Landfall, and Margaret Orbell’s Anthology of Contemporary Māori Writing

Gordon Walters biography – Dictionary of New Zealand Biography website

All 76 issues of Te Ao Hou are available to read online. Access is free, and the site is fully searchable.

Te Ao Hou website

Permission of the National Library of New Zealand Te Puna Mātauranga o Aotearoa must be obtained before any reuse of this image.

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