Story: Waterfalls

Petrus van der Velden was a Dutch painter who arrived in Christchurch in 1890, and soon began visiting the Ōtira Gorge. Seeking a sense of God’s powerful presence through nature, he preferred days when the wind howled and the rain poured. This scene (1891) captures the mood, and has become a well-known New Zealand painting. Although it was bought by the Dunedin Public Art Gallery for the then considerable sum of £130, van der Velden struggled to make a living in New Zealand and eventually left in 1898.