Craig Platt
New Zealand Bird Artist
Craig Platt is a contemporary wildlife artist, specialising in paintings of New Zealand native birds. Auckland-based, Craig’s realistic bird portrait painting and wildlife art result from hours of observation, demonstrating an almost uncanny understanding of bird life and habits in their natural environments.
Exhibitions
Bio
Craig Platt is an Auckland-based contemporary New Zealand artist known for his incredibly realistic oil paintings of New Zealand native birds. Craig’s NZ bird art and his large wildlife landscapes are inspired less by photographs and more by observation and research. Influenced by his background in graphic design, Craig looks for colour and detail in his subjects, while also noting down unique subtleties in their behaviour.
I have observed tūī in their natural environment for years. It’s their personality, they almost have an arrogance about them as if they know they have adjusted better than most other native birds to the urban environment.
Travelling to remote locations around New Zealand, Craig will sit and study his subjects for hours. It is here, without distraction, that Craig gains insight into certain bird habits and their particular or unusual postures. Māori mythology and New Zealand history have also been influential in Craig’s NZ art, as he shares his learning about the role of our native birds in founding stories and in the sophisticated structure of Māori beliefs and customs. While he observes bird interaction in their natural habitats, Craig is also interested in the way birds engage with man-made objects in urban environments.
This shed at Stanley Point wharf, Devonport is the most amazing colour, and the lighting effects the colour generates are beautiful. When the lighting is right on a clear, still day, the angles of the tin create rich dark and light hues of the base colour...
I started reading the signage one day as I admired the lettering skills of a profession I was once involved in. The beautiful brush control on the serif font is a skill long-forgotten, and the aging of the sign and the rust creeping into the fixtures adds to the time and history of the shed. Also, the message the sign portrays—the choice of wording goes back to a time when certain language was acceptable… I wonder what the colour of the shed was back then. The modern sign has almost been produced to clash with maximum impact.
So what is so dangerous that you can’t dive from this shed? …I have used two species of birds to almost thumb their noses at the authority behind the signage… The terns’ balletic skills, skimming the surface of the bay, and their precise diving skills are a majestic sight. The Kingfishers, ever vigilant, notice any movement in the tidal zone. They pounce on any unsuspecting crustacean moving from cover…
Craig’s painting process always begins with sketching and a colour study, to see if all the elements he has in mind will work together. The blocking in of the composition begins with broad brush strokes to fill the canvas and create a base for the painting. The vision is then built up using finer and finer brushes to achieve high detail. By the end of the painting, Craig will be using a tiny brush (almost a pencil) to note fine detail on a blade of grass or the glint in a bird’s eye.
Craig developed his understanding of colour and his skills in realism, precision, and detail during his 25-year career in graphic design, where he specialised in illustration and packaging. his passion for birds began at a much younger age when he raised and rescued nestlings; sparrows that had fallen from a nest, blackbirds, thrushes, and many other species spent time in his parents’ hot water cupboard. He moved on to raise and breed budgies for many years and began to draw birds as a child. Craig’s strong interest in New Zealand’s great outdoor spaces grew through his love of surfing, which took him all over the country. Today, his travelling and his love of birds are expressed through his art.
Craig Platt has regular exhibitions at Art by the Sea Gallery. His work, particularly his tui painting, is held in private collections across the country.