Renowned Christchurch-born artist Philippa Blair had a world-wide influence: as well as being an important teacher, her work is held in 46 public and private collections, both in New Zealand and overseas. Purchasers as diverse as David Bowie, the Australian National Gallery and the Long Beach Museum of Art in California, bought a work or works by Philippa Blair, a testament to her significance as a major artist. The daughter of an academic microbiologist and a singer who was an art school contemporary of Rita Angus, Blair graduated with a Diploma of Fine Arts (painting) from the University of Canterbury in 1967. After time in Wairoa and Australia she moved to Auckland, where she was a regular exhibitor and also completed large works for a Cook Island church and the Aotea Centre. She also taught at the University of Auckland.
Blair returned to Christchurch in 1985, as a lecturer and artist. In 1990 the Long Beach Museum of Art organised the exhibition Three from New Zealand which showed Blair’s work alongside Christine Hellyar and Ralph Hotere. In 1995, she moved to southern California with her second husband, the architect and painter John Rolf Porter. Philippa Blair died in Auckland on January 5 aged 79.
