Check out our Awesome Artwork and Merchandise for sale by Māpura Artists.

Important dates for 2024:

Term One: 30 Jan to 12 April 2024
(11 weeks)

Term Two: 29 April to 5 July 2024
(10 weeks)

Term Three: 22 July to 27 September 2024 (10 weeks)

Term Four: 14 October to 13 December 2024 (9 weeks)

NB: Māpura Studios welcomes enrolments at any point during a term

or contact Alex on:
Ph: 09 845 5361
Mob: 0220 454 391
E: alex@mapurastudios.org.nz

Check out Our Video featured on RNZ Checkpoint - Artists’ Putting Their Lives Back Together at Māpura

Click on image for Video From Checkpoint, 5:41 pm on 25 March 2021 - Nick Truebridge, Checkpoint Reporter: nick.truebridge@rnz.co.nz

Click on image for Video
From Checkpoint, 5:41 pm on 25 March 2021 - Nick Truebridge, Checkpoint Reporter: nick.truebridge@rnz.co.nz

Welcome to Māpura

Māpura Studios is a creative space located in central Auckland with satellite groups in other areas.

We offer inclusive, multi-modal art classes and art therapy programmes for people of all ages, diversity and need, as well as the wider community. These include visual art, music, cartooning, dance, performance and therapy programmes.

We provide a professional service in person-centred visual arts learning, creative therapies, and arts practice – and maintain an extensive exhibition calendar for our artists.

Our studio is located in a pleasant, airy setting at Rocky Nook Bowls in Fowlds Park, St Lukes. There is easy and ample access for people in wheelchairs, as well as a carpark.

Māpura Studios is an independent organisation, administered by Panacea Arts Charitable Trust and funded by grants and programme fees.

Above: Pasifika video created by Phil Botha.
Featuring: Maununu & Ululau Ama, Leonie Brunt, John Puhara, Ela Tukuhaukava

My art is about my life.
It is a good way to deal with stuff.
Making art is a way I can express ideas and concepts that have real meaning in my life.
— Allyson Hamblett

Michael Nathan Lost in Space (Winner 2019 IHC Awards)

Michael Nathan Lost in Space (Winner 2019 IHC Awards)

What is Art Therapy?

The creative arts therapies are based on the idea that creativity enhances the well-being of all people, and is a natural aspect of all cultures and human experience. It is an experiential psychotherapeutic approach utilising many creative modalities within a therapeutic relationship with a trained therapist. It is holistic – attending to emotional, cognitive, physical and spiritual well-being – and aligns well with indigenous models of health and well-being. 

The creative arts therapies use creative processes to help clients explore and express unconscious material that is often difficult to articulate in words. These methods are innovative, participatory and practical: they provide a supportive space for participants to ‘try on’ and practise new behaviours, and this can be more effective than merely talking about change. Creativity harnesses the imagination and a sense of play. This can help those who have limited choices in their life to use the safe space of the therapeutic environment to learn to tolerate the uncertainty of the unknown, and to become more comfortable to be able to improvise and open up new possibilities in their lives. A key feature of the creative arts therapies is that the processes are often pleasurable. This means that using the arts we are more likely to practice new patterns of more healthy behaviour. The activities practiced in this treatment model can thus provide new hobbies and interests which are vital for ongoing self-support. 

Source: ANZCATA