John Johns

John Johns

Charles Ninow Fine Art Dealer
102/203 Karangahape Road, Auckland Central 

15 February - 15 March 2025

Preview Friday, 14 February, from 6–8pm

John Johns, Habitat of Native Orchids, Avenue of Corsican Pine, Hamner Forest Park, 1985, gelatin silver print, 254 x 404mm

John Johns (1921–1999) was born in England and, once he’d returned from serving in the Royal Air Force during WWII, he joined the British Forestry Commission. In 1951, he immigrated to Aotearoa, where he joined the New Zealand Forest Service, initially working as a forestry worker. Thanks to his knowledge of forest management and expertise in photography, he later became the Forest Service’s first official photographer. 

Johns was a passionate environmentalist, and his photographs advocate for natural environments that need protection. At the same time, they also record the human relationship with the natural world in Aotearoa. Whether it is the fact that some photographs were taken from an aeroplane far above or that others feature rows of planted trees receding into the horizon, they speak to the delicate and precarious balance of sustainable living. That’s the interesting thing about his images: this tension is always there, always felt, even if it’s not pictured. A Johns image may depict a serene forest, but the whir of human progress is never far away. 

This exhibition comprises photographs printed by Johns himself, which have been held in his family’s collection and have not been publicly displayed before. It features large prints of some of his most well-known images, as well as rarer, lesser-known works. 

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