Nicholas Chevalier Near Paekakariki Cook Strait 1868
Te Papa collection search lists 1868 work named Near Paekakariki Cook Strait
A documented 1868 view of the Kāpiti coast
Te Papa holds Nicholas Chevalier’s watercolour Near Paekakariki, Cook Strait, dated 1868 (registration 1912-0044-265). The work measures 368 by 250 millimetres and entered the collection as a gift from the artist’s widow, Caroline Chevalier, in 1912. Te Papa identifies three Māori waka in the scene.
The museum explains that Chevalier travelled in the lower North Island in November 1868 and later reused elements of this and his companion Kāpiti watercolour in larger compositions. The picture is both a historical view of the coast and a composed work of art: details in later paintings were rearranged. It should therefore be read as an artist’s representation, not a photograph or proof of a particular whaling incident.
Research source: collections.tepapa.govt.nz — view record
A nineteenth-century view of the coast
Nicholas Chevalier’s 1868 depiction of the coast near Paekākāriki is a work of art made after the most intensive decades of shore whaling. It can help readers imagine the landscape and its relationship to Cook Strait, but it should not be used as a direct illustration of a specific 1839 whaling event. The artist, date, medium, holding institution and image rights are part of the object’s history, and the picture connects naturally to the library’s books on landscape and early coastal routes.