Mark Cross

New Zealand born Mark Cross moved at the age of 23 to his wife’s home on the Polynesian island of Niue and it was during these early years that a strong philosophic and stylistic foundation was established for his career as an artist. Due to this continued isolation, Cross has worked on the 'periphery', of the traditional art industry.

Cross has developed a reputation as one of the South Pacific’s leading contemporary realist painters and now divides his time between studios in Niue and New Zealand while travelling and exhibiting elsewhere. His paintings over time have emerged from being informed by the extended immersion in an isolated, water-bound, natural environment into a universal vision that questions the foibles of Mankind.

Elements of the New Zealand and Niue environment became the atmospheric stages for these allegorical communications although more recently he has employed similarly unique landscapes from around the world. In their ethereal, visionary way, the works warn of the dire ecological imperatives that face both a small island and a planet.

Mark Cross has achieved through his work a uniqueness that avoids the trappings of provincialism, so often associated with realism, and replaces it with an acu...

Self Educated:

Solo Exhibitions

No Longer exhibiting.

2015 "Liquid Landscapes" Pierre Peeters Gallery, Auckland
2012 "Works in Transit". Pierre Peeters Gallery, Auckland
2005 "Sheep Country". Real Gallery Auckland
2004 Heta: Power and Fragility. Photographs SOCA gallery Auckland
Heta: Power and Fragility. Photographs Whangarei Art Museum
Wide Island. Paintings of Central Otago. Milford Gallery, Dunedin
2003 Recent Works: John Leech Gallery Auckland
2002 “Have We Offended” Te Manawa, Museum and Art Gallery
2002 Cook islands National Museum, Cook Is
1998- Haleiwa Gallery, Hawaii
1997 Woodcuts, John Leech Gallery, Auckland
1996 Premier Gallery, Hawaii
1995 “Life Stills” John Leech Gallery, Auckland
1994 Canterbury Society of Arts, Christchurch
XPO Exhibitions/John Leech Gallery, Auckland
1993 “Anomalies”, John Leech Gallery, Auckland
1991 John Leech Gallery, Auckland
1989 Auckland Society of Arts, Auckland
North Gallery, Whangarei
Baycourt Cultural Centre, Tauranga
1988 Canterbury Society of Arts, Christchurch
Huanaki Cultural Centre, Niue
1987 QEII Arts Council Funded touring exhibition
NSA Whangarei
ASA Auckland
WSA Hamilton
1985 Molesworth Gallery Wellington


Group Exhibitions

2010- Conn...