Thoughts That Make Us Think
Hugo Van Dorsser and
Catarina Correia Arnhold
29 November – 20 December 2025
With a sense of play and punchy, evocative colour at the centre - ‘Thoughts That Make Us Think’ is a meeting of Hugo Van Dorsser and Catarina Correia Arnhold’s material worlds. Gallery walls are met with a bold expression of life and an unapologetic exploration into how the artists’ materials can perform on behalf of their intuition and imagination. At times looking back in nostalgia, while others look inward toward the spirit and self.
Van Dorsser works, predominately in oil paint, in thick strokes. Drawn with a confident hand in building block shapes, he references childhood with toy cars and little houses, as well as employing the symbol of the butterfly to explore hope and change - all collaged together with a blurry face hidden at the side. They are dreamlike, the surreal spelt out with each canvas, Van Drosser piecing together - and thus inviting his viewers - into an emotional landscape of shared nostalgia.
Correia Arnhold’s gritty clay shapes are a visualisation of emotion - created quickly, roughly - following her at the height of feeling. Spanning both three dimensional and wall bound, each piece is an exploration of the artist’s central symbols of the subconscious, religion and memory. Rough clay is layered in glossy, bright pastel glazes, set against deep, matte finishes - working in juxtaposition to expose conflicting narratives. Her use of the lone rider, priests, a crowd and holy figures throughout, asks of reality versus imagination, sentimentality versus fantasy, day to day versus the preternatural. An ongoing balance between a welcomed freedom of material and a language of myth, memory, and personal narrative.
The two artists sidestep together into a landscape of play. Testing boundary lines between material and reality, between fantasy and a blurred memory - all lit in vivid colour. ‘Thoughts That Make Us Think’ asks us to pace along after them, indulged in their two worlds.
Join us for the opening celebration on Friday, 28 November at 6pm – both artists will be present.
INSTALLATION VIEWS
ARTWORKS
The Artists
Hugo van Dorsser is a visual artist working primarily in oil paint, whose current practice explores themes of memory and domestic life.
Based in Lyttelton, Aotearoa, Hugo draws inspiration from childhood fancies and familiar objects such as toys and household scenes, creating compositions that merge personal history with imagined narratives. These works are arranged to evoke the perspective of an outsider looking in on a dream – layered, surreal, and emotionally charged. Through this blending of lived experience and imagination, he invites viewers to reflect on their own formative experiences and the shared emotional landscape of nostalgia.
Catarina Correia Arnhold is a multidisciplinary ceramic artist whose practice centres storytelling, intuition, and the space between reality and fantasy.
Born in Salvador, Brazil and based in Lyttelton, Aotearoa, she creates work that merges sculpture and painting, bringing her background in two-dimensional art into dialogue with the unpredictable nature of clay. Arnhold embraces process and play, allowing forms to emerge through touch and instinct. Drawing on myth, recollection, and personal narrative, her work is influenced by literature, folklore, and religious symbolism, inviting viewers into dreamlike worlds that feel both ancient and imagined. Through bold colour and form, her works become tactile stories, full of potential and presence.
