Hutton and Cotton: The McGregor Museum Revisited

Hutton and Cotton is an installation that investigates taxonomies and threatened species with references to The University of Auckland’s own museum history. Artist Christine Hellyar makes use of the chaos and order of the partly demolished McGregor Museum in the School of Biological Sciences. Her work considers the divisions of animal, vegetable and mineral, and combines the history of museums and the history of art. The names in the title refer to Hutton, the 19th Century author of the first reference book on New Zealand native animals, and Cotton, the 20th century geomorphologist who had a great influence on painter Colin McCahon.

Hellyar has held a life-long love for private and public museums. Many of her works explore our relationships with objects and collections, particularly how they are kept, valued and displayed. The McGregor Museum’s collections were started in 1884, and in 1939 moved into purpose-built spaces in the Old Biology Building on Symonds Street, designed by Roy Lippincott.