During November 2022 public art galleries throughout New Zealand will be showing art works by celebrated expatriate artist Douglas MacDiarmid to mark the 100th anniversary of his birth in November 1922.

He studied at Canterbury University College in literature, languages and philosophy. He had no formal art training, rather he was mentored by members of the Christchurch Group, an association of avant-garde artists in Christchurch. After WWII he travelled overseas and from 1952 he became a full-time artist based in Paris, living there until his death, aged 97 in 2020. He retained his ties to New Zealand however, with regular exhibitions and trips back.  He had a solo exhibition here at the Bishop Suter Art Gallery in 1969.

MacDiarmid is the man seated in Figure Allegory, a painting in the current Rita Angus NZ Modernist exhibition (on the end wall). He first showed his paintings with the Christchurch Group in their annual exhibitions (1945-1963), along with Rita Angus and Leo Bensemann. His first solo exhibition was in 1950 at the Helen Hitchings Gallery in Wellington-there is a portrait of Hitchings in the Angus exhibition.

The Blue Bowl  (detail) 1965 Oil on canvas
Collection of The Suter Art Gallery Te Aratoi o Whakatū; Purchased in 1969 ACC: 409