Born in Auckland, New Zealand in 1941 and raised in the far north of rural New Zealand, Peter Peryer frequently incorporates elements from a suburban context in his sombre photographs: the work Marsden cross — with the weathered monument standing sentinel-like in the landscape — is one such example.

Marsden cross, photographed at Kerikeri, Bay of Islands, is named after Samuel Marsden, an English-born missionary who arrived in Sydney in 1794 and during the early nineteenth century did much to pave the way for the colonisation of New Zealand.¹

Endnote:

1. See Yarwood, AT, 'Marsden, Samuel (1765–1838)', Australian Dictionary of Biography, Vol.2, Melbourne University Press, 1967, pp.207–12.