Breaking Waves: Ocean News

In an electric vehicle you quickly learn when you can gun the engine, how to use the many apps – and how to enjoy the time while the car is charging I quickly discovered two important things when recently taking a three week drive over several thousand kilometres in an electric car. The first is that “range anxiety’’ is very real. The second is that veteran EV drivers are often there for us neophytes. First, some background. I’d always planned to get an electric car eventually – but then, just before Christmas, the petrol engine of our 17-year-old second-hand Subaru finally cooked itself after 360,000-plus kilometres. Continue reading...

For more than two decades, Pardington has been photographing taonga (Māori cultural treasures) and natural history specimens in museums around the world. In the South Canterbury museum, she was struck by a collection of stuffed native birds which had been subject to taxidermy – many of them now extinct or endangered. They inspired a new human-scale portrait series of these manu (birds), revered within Māori culture as intermediaries between human and divine worlds. The resulting works will be exhibited at the 2026 Venice Biennale. Pardington invites viewers to reconsider how they think of birds, and how we might better protect them Fiona Pardington: Taharaki Skyside will be exhibited at the Aotearoa New Zealand pavilion at the Venice Biennale from 9 May – 22 November 2026 Continue reading...

I’ve recently noticed several signs of adulthood in my behaviour. At first I was horrified, but I have come to accept, even enjoy, the natural ageing process I nearly drove into a wall the other day, because I couldn’t take my eyes off some spectacular wisteria. Ten years ago I doubt I would have even noticed it, or known what it was, never mind been so transfixed that I unwittingly endangered my life. It’s pretty much invisible in your youth, and then suddenly, at a certain age, or stage, you see it, appreciate it and become mesmerised by its impressive display. My botanical brush with death was the moment that I knew for certain: no matter how I feel inside, I am now unquestionably a grownup. This wisteria hysteria isn’t an isolated incident, of course. There have been several other definitely adult signifiers: Continue reading...

As Covid-era funding dries up and bus services are cut, a food insecurity crisis is brewing from Tennessee to Rhode Island Zen’Yari Winters’ job, at a pet shop in East Memphis, Tennessee, should be a 20-minute trip from her house. She leaves herself three hours to get there. “The bus is always, always late,” she said – if it shows up at all. It’s not just her work commute that’s affected by the time-consuming guessing game that is riding with the Memphis Area Transit Authority (Mata). The only full-service grocer in the Chelsea-Hollywood area where she lives closed in 2025. To shop for food in person, she could take two buses for a 13-mile (20km) trip to Walmart. But she risks waiting at bus stops for hours with perishables – or shelling out about $24 for an Uber back. Continue reading...