Alumni Artists Return to Campus with New Exhibitions

Two graduate art exhibitions have officially opened at Te Ara o Mauao Gallery on campus at Toi Ohomai in Tauranga.

A large crowd gathered to celebrate the opening of Wings of Waste by Fiorella Silva Perez (pictured) and The Green Carcass by Kim Fifield on Thursday, 21 August 2025. Both artists completed a Bachelor of Creative Industries (Visual Arts) at Toi Ohomai in 2020 and 2022 respectively.

Fiorella Silva Perez’s Wings of Waste is a mixed-media series that explores the tension between the beauty of Aotearoa’s native birds and the harshness of human pollution. Using waste materials collected from beaches across the North Island (including plastics, packaging, and discarded frames), Fiorella’s five artworks are primarily oil-based and depict the growing environmental cost of consumerism, and how waste is intruding on nature.

Kim Fifield’s The Green Carcass is an immersive installation that considers how people have become increasingly disconnected from the natural world, and are instead exploiting it. Constructed from cultivated root systems, oat and wheat grass, foliage, soil, wood, rope, fiberglass and tulle, The Green Carcass represents issues such as ecocide, capitalism, and consumerism, and advocates for a more sustainable, respectful relationship with the environment. 

Toi Ohomai Academic Staff Member – Art, Kyle Sattler, says Te Ara o Mauao Gallery is reserved around September each year to host a graduate art exhibition.

“This year, we called for submissions from our creative arts graduates and saw an opportunity to feature two artists instead of one, making the most of the gallery space available. Kim and Fiorella’s exhibitions share some similar themes, with their focus on environmental issues and consumerism.”

“Exhibiting graduates’ artworks in our on-campus gallery - which is open to the public – allows Toi Ohomai to celebrate the achievements of our alumni, uplift their practice, and offer the wider Tauranga Moana community access to high-calibre, non-commercial contemporary art. Opening night was a huge success. Both Kim and Fiorella can be incredibly proud of their works, as well as what they’ve gone on to achieve since studying at Toi Ohomai,” Kyle says.

Kim, a Papamoa Beach-based visual artist, recently earned a Master of Visual Arts with First Class Honours from Whitecliffe New Zealand. She continues to research and integrate eco-friendly materials such as woven root systems and algae-based biopolymers into her practice. 

Fiorella has completed a Master’s of Education, and now teaches Art and Spanish at Bethlehem College in Tauranga.

Fiorella expressed her gratitude to those in attendance at the opening event.

“Thank you so much for coming. It means a lot to have so many friends, family, students, and members of the art community here tonight…. When I began my Bachelor of Creative Industries (Visual Arts) in 2018, everyone made me feel so welcome – students, staff, and the wider faculty. That support gave me the confidence to keep creating and complete my studies. When I heard about this graduate exhibition opportunity, I thought, why not apply? And here I am. I’m so thankful to Toi Ohomai for making this opportunity possible,” Fiorella said.

View Wings of Waste and The Green Carcass exhibitions:
•    Open to the public free-of-change, Monday to Friday, 9am - 5pm, until Friday 12 September.
•    Te Ara o Mauao Gallery (M Block), Toi Ohomai Tauranga campus, 70 Windermere Drive, Tauranga.
•    The Green Carcass is featured in the central exhibition space, while Wings of Waste is in the adjacent gallery space to the left as you enter.