Caroline McQuarrie

Caroline Lucy McQuarrie (born 1975) is a New Zealand artist and senior lecturer in photography at Massey University in Wellington. McQuarrie's work explores social, colonial and land-use histories, and the role of photography and hand-crafted textiles in representing or questioning these complex narratives.

Life McQuarrie was born in 1975 in Greymouth, on the West Coast of the South Island. Her father, Bob McQuarrie, was a potter and her mother, Barbara McQuarrie, a textile artist. McQuarrie enjoyed drawing from an early age, and was influenced by friends of her family, photographer Frank Simpson and potter Daphne Simpson, who together ran Coast Craft in Greymouth. Daphne taught McQuarrie to draw and paint, and she studied photography and painting in her final year of high school.

Artistic career

In 2010, McQuarrie was an artist in residence at Samuel Marsden Collegiate School for five weeks. The main work McQuarrie produced during the residency, ‘Gullies’, was a finalist in the 2025 Molly Morpeth Canaday Award. thumb McQuarrie's work often explores personal and family histories, particular of early Pākehā settler women, combining photography and textiles in her art.

McQuarrie has used alternative photography techniques like cyanotype and photograms, and incorporates crochet, sewing, and stitching into her work.

In 2021, Jhana Millers Gallery started representing McQuarrie and her first solo show with the dealer gallery was The New Sun, which included linen samplers embroidered with the imagined words of pioneer women, complemented by colour photographs of the landscapes transformed by mining.

Significant works This is the First Day of My Life (2008–09), a floor work made of recycled wool, cotton, and acrylic

Select solo exhibitions Reasons for Silence. 2010, Toi Pōneke Gallery, Te Whanganui-a-Tara Wellington. Artifact. 19 June – 21 July 2012, Blue Oyster Art Project Space, Dunedin. No Town. 24 April 2014 – 23 August 2015, Aratoi, Masterton; Carnegie Gallery, Hokitika; Left Bank Art Gallery, Greymouth; Te Uru Waitākere, Auckland. Homewardbounder. 1 April – 25 April 2015, Enjoy Public Art Gallery, Te Whanganui-a-Tara Wellington. Waiuta. 16 November – 10 December 2015, Plymouth University, United Kingdom. The New Sun. 11 February – 13 March 2021, Jhana Millers Gallery, Te Whanganui-a-Tara Wellington. The Blasted Heath. 2022, Jhana Millers Gallery, Te Whanganui-a-Tara Wellington. Like The Turf. 2 November 2024 - 26 January 2025, Forrester Gallery, Ōamaru. The land, again. 31 January 2026 - 19 April 2026, Aratoi Wairarapa Museum of Art and History, Masterton.

Select group exhibitions The Hive Hums With Many Minds. 12 March - 24 May 2016, Te Tuhi, Pakuranga, Auckland, curated by Bruce E. Phillips. Prospects Fearful. With Shaun Matthews, 2018 - 2021, Suter Art Gallery, Nelson; Carnegie Gallery, Hokitika Museum; Left Bank Art Gallery, Greymouth; Hastings City Art Gallery, Heretaunga. Slow Burn: Women and Photography | Ahi Tāmau: Māreikura Whakaahua. 1 March 2026 - 31 January 2027, Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa, Te Whanganui-a-Tara Wellington.

Collections Dowse Art Museum, Lower Hutt. City Art Collection, Wellington. The Suter Art Gallery Te Aratoi o Whakatū, Nelson. Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa, Wellington.