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  • Te Mata Peak, Dusk

  • Queenstown Quiet Reflection

  • Marlborough Looking South

  • Marlborough Looking North

  • Evans Bay to Newtown, Brooklyn and Beyond

Aerial Aotearoa Series

The paintings above will be available at the NZ Art Show

Maiken Calkoen: Artist

I grew up mainly in Hawke’s Bay and studied Architecture at Victoria University in Wellington. Currently, I work as a Design and Visual Communication teacher at Karamū High School in Hastings.
I started painting after finishing university, inspired by the places I lived overseas: Amsterdam, Galway, and Edinburgh, back in 2003 and 2004. When I moved back to Wellington, I spent the next ten years painting scenes of the city there.  
In 2015, I returned to my hometown of Hastings and began documenting that experience through photography, focusing mainly on architectural subjects. I’m a passionate advocate for Hawke’s Bay, and over the last decade I’ve created many paintings celebrating the region’s landscapes and architecture. My paintings are known for their vibrant colours, panoramic views, and the way they capture light at different times of day and across the seasons.
In 2022, I completed a Fulbright Teaching Scholarship at Indiana University of Pennsylvania. While there, I took part in a landscape painting course that really challenged me to explore new approaches, trying out unfamiliar subjects and working on multiple paintings at once. That experience reignited my love of painting and led me to join the Art Guide and Art Trail for the first time in 2023, and I’m back again this year for more!
Over the past couple of years, I’ve exhibited in a range of shows and galleries, including The NZ Art Show in Wellington and Agora Gallery in New York City.  I also had a solo exhibition at Arts Inc Heretaunga at the beginning of this year called Building Memory which included over 40 paintings of Hawke’s Bay.  
Recently, my landscape painting Tutaekuri, Puketapu, Bay View and Beyond was awarded Highly Commended in the Hawke’s Bay Art Review. Three of my works will also be showing at the Affordable Art Show at Muse Gallery in Havelock North later this month.  I am currently working towards a collection of paintings for the New Zealand Art Show in Wellington, King's Birthday 2026.

This exhibition comes from a deep connection with Hastings and wider Hawke’s Bay, the memories of growing up here and glimpses of the architectural aspects of the area. It depicts layers of memory and history mainly through representation of the built environment.

Maiken moved back to Hastings in January 2015, this exhibition marks ten years since she returned to her hometown. Initially she was drawn to documenting the architectural gems and unique characteristics of Hastings using photography and her instagram account.  This grew into a photographic project in 2016 in which she exhibited around 400 photos in the window of the Common Room and did a PechaKucha presentation exclaiming the wonders of “stings”. The reaction from the public and locals was a mixture of the nostalgia for the Hastings of the past, combined with the excitement of its preservation and revitalisation.  Maiken relished the conversations that started from her photos as memories were sparked and stories were told.  

Since then Maiken witnessed how many of the buildings that she had photographed were disappearing, being demolished, or, being renovated, re-branded and re-purposed. Even her recent photographs were becoming historical records.  

This led to more of a focus on paintings of Hastings which reflect and evoke the collective and recent memory of place and the incremental change that is characteristic of small cities.  Hawke’s Bay has its Spanish Mission, Art Deco and specific architectural heritage to trigger memories of specific times and events, but it also shares the universality of the change that most regional cities and all urban environments experience as the way we live our life changes and evolves.  This exhibition aims to evoke memory of the specific places depicted, or, of the inevitable change we all recognise in the places we love and connect with.