The charm of Clarry Neame

Across an astonishing seven decades, Clarry Neame, widely regarded as one of Marlborough’s foremost artists, has always had either a pencil or paintbrush in his hands. Frank Nelson looks back at the life of Marlborough’s cultural treasure.

From the age of four, jostling with siblings in a modest, two-bedroom house at Spring Creek, to the 76-year-old working out of his home studio in Blenheim, the creative passion has never dulled for Clarry Neame.

“I can remember drawing when I was four-years-old and at primary school I had a painting accepted for a touring primary schools art exhibition,” he said. “I loved art. I loved painting and drawing. And that’s still all I want to do.”

Today his paintings, primarily colourful, impressionist works which generally sell for between $2000 and $8000, are prized by collectors around New Zealand and in many other countries across the world.

No wonder then that earlier this year Clarry was awarded the prestigious honour of Marlborough Living Cultural Treasure for 2023. He is the 13th recipient of the award which is limited to no more than 10 people at any one time.

Established in 2012 by Marlborough Museum in partnership with the district council and The Marlborough Express, the award recognises those who have demonstrated a lifetime of excellence in cultural endeavour and are a source of community inspiration.

Clarry modestly prefers to talk about rewards (from doing his work) rather than awards. And he’s also quick to share the honour with his wife Helen, “She’s the real treasure. Without her I wouldn’t be where I am now. We’re a good team.”

At the official ceremony, where mayor Nadine Taylor presented a medal and certificate, Clarry proudly wore a korowai, a woven feather cloak, made by his Māori mother Anituhia and kept in the museum at Brayshaw Park.

Clarry, the middle of nine children, was born in 1947 at Holmdale, the former maternity home in Blenheim. He grew up in Spring Creek where he started school before going on to Bohally and then Marlborough College, which only later split into separate boys and girls schools.

He can’t recall his parents or any of his siblings showing an interest in art and “there was no art in the house,” so he’s not sure where his own artistic talents sprang from.

Though art was his passion, throughout school it still had to compete with his love of sports – rugby, cricket, basketball, table tennis and golf. He reckons playing so many sports caused him to miss school certificate initially and he barely scraped through next time, with only modest marks, even for art. However, that all changed when he left school at 17 and enrolled at the Wellington School of Design where the three-year course included not just drawing and painting but also things like screen printing, photography and design work.

“We did drawing every day out on the streets,” said Clarry, plus life drawing with models. But at times sport was still a distraction, “There we were, life drawing with a nude model, and I’ve got a transistor radio behind the curtain listening to Marlborough playing Seddon Shield rugby!”

On another occasion when he’d snuck out of class to watch the West Indies cricketers playing at the Basin Reserve, he was surprised to find three of his tutors already there!

However, without the parental financial support enjoyed by many of the students, Clarry found living in Wellington a struggle. He had earned money in the freezing works to get there and then had to take a cleaning job at nights to make ends meet.

“It was really tough,” he said. “But it didn’t do me any harm. I felt like I earned my way through it. A lot of the kids who were well supported dropped by the wayside in the end.”

Once the course ended, Clarry began life as a commercial artist and in the early 1970s, after six years working for other people, he decided to go out on his own doing design work for a wide range of products from Griffin’s biscuits packets to T-shirts. He and Helen were married in 1970 and nine years later their first daughter, Katy, was born, followed three years afterwards by Georgina. And three years after that, when the girls were aged six and three, Clarry began working from home as a freelance commercial artist.

This move meant he was able to spend more time looking after his daughters while also carving out more space for his own painting. “I always wanted to paint fulltime,” he said, though his own art had tended to become something just squeezed in at night after his normal working days.

Taking care of the children had always come easily to Clarry with his background growing up in a large family. “I could cook. We all took turns at cooking,” he said. “And I knew all about changing nappies!”

At the end of 1992 the family moved to Marlborough and about three years later Helen began working at Hunter’s Wines, something she still does besides handling Clarry’s bookwork and being his number one cheerleader.

Indeed, that job at Hunter’s was to change the trajectory of Clarry’s artistic career. One day, talking to owner Jane Hunter, he joked about becoming the winery’s resident artist.

To his surprise, Jane liked the idea and before long had located a potential studio building, had it delivered and then lifted into place by a crane. So, in 1996 Clarry moved in and became Hunter’s artist-inresidence for the next 24 years.

“It was a mutually beneficial relationship,” said Jane. “We gained another attraction for visitors to the winery/cellar door and Clarry’s artworks were on show for the many visitors from home and abroad.

“Clarry’s paintings have been taken back to all corners of the world and given him and Hunter’s greater exposure than we would have had without him. His vineyard scenes, in particular, were very popular.”

The studio also acted as a magnet for primary school visits. “I spent an awful lot of time with the kids,” said Clarry, who encouraged them to imitate his flamboyant impressionist style by squashing paint onto the canvas using a palette knife.

A number of Clarry’s paintings remain for sale in that studio though he now works from home in Blenheim. He tries to paint every day, starting at 9am, but admits his abiding passion for golf sometimes gets in the way.

Clarry says, at Hunter’s he finished more than 100 paintings one super-productive year while his annual output was more typically around 50 to 60; these days he tends to works on larger canvases with each taking about a month to complete.

He sells some work from home but most sales come through four commercial outlets – The Gallery Havelock, Parker Gallery in Nelson, and North Island galleries in Ohope and Waihi Beach.

“It’s a precarious life,” he chuckles. “But who cares… it’s only money. It’s a love job for anyone in the arts these days but you know what, I wouldn’t swap it for anything.”

Clarry and Helen still find time for golf and enjoy their four grandchildren, two of them teenagers in Blenheim. “I’m 76 now and I just think how lucky I am,” says Marlborough’s newest cultural treasure.