From Canvas to Cloth: Honouring John Weeks Through Wearable Art
In a quiet union of elegance and legacy, The Suter Art Gallery Te Aratoi o Whakatū has partnered with New Zealand silk atelier LoveSilk to transform a art piece by modernist painter John Weeks into a limited-edition silk scarf—inviting art lovers, collectors, and style devotees to wear a piece of cultural history.
A Modernist Touchstone, Reborn in Silk
The artwork at the centre of this collaboration is African City, a striking oil-on-strawboard composition by John Weeks (1886–1965), considered one of New Zealand’s earliest abstractionists. Inspired by his time spent travelling across Morocco, Algeria and Tunisia in the 1920s, the piece is rich with Cubist influence and architectural lyricism. It’s a work that hums with geometry and rhythm—making it uniquely suited to reinterpretation on silk.
The Suter Art Gallery, a cultural institution with roots dating back to 1890 and a legacy of nurturing New Zealand’s artistic landscape, selected African City as part of an ongoing initiative to bring art beyond gallery walls and into daily life.
From Gallery to Garment: A Silk Story
The collaboration with LoveSilk began as a conversation between curators and creatives—a shared vision for translating canvas into cloth, pigment into pattern, legacy into living design.
“We saw in African City not just a painting, but a blueprint for movement,” says a representative from LoveSilk. “The composition almost folds in on itself, like silk. There’s tension and balance. We knew it could live beautifully beyond the frame.”
Working closely with The Suter’s curatorial team, LoveSilk’s designers transform art work with exacting attention to detail, preserving the tonal architecture and palette while adapting it for the tactile nuances of silk. The result is a scarf that feels both archival and modern, artistic and effortlessly wearable.
John Weeks: The Artist Behind the Abstraction
John Weeks, born in Devon and raised in New Zealand, was a trailblazer of early 20th-century painting in Aotearoa. After studying in Europe and teaching at the Elam School of Fine Arts, he brought a distinctly international perspective to local modernism.
Weeks was heavily influenced by the Cubist style of André Lhote, with whom he studied in Paris, and his extensive travels across North Africa lent a worldly texture to his compositions. He was among the first New Zealand painters to fully embrace geometric abstraction—his work prioritising rhythm, colour, and form over representation.
Today, his legacy continues through The Suter’s permanent collection, and now, through the softly folded corners of silk.
A Scarf That Carries a Story
Woven from 100% pure mulberry silk and finished with hand-rolled edges, the African City scarf is more than a fashion piece—it’s a portable archive, a wearable fragment of modernist heritage.
Styled knotted at the neck, looped through a bag, or draped over the shoulders, it moves like a poem—expressive, layered, and quietly bold. The geometric forms echo architectural cities long travelled, now softened by fabric and light.
Only a limited number of scarves have been produced, making this a collector’s piece for art lovers and aesthetes alike.
Where to Find It
The African City silk scarf is available exclusively through The Suter Art Gallery in Nelson and online at LoveSilk.co.nz.