Opening night:
Friday 6th September, 5pm – 7pm

Simon Lewis Wards is an artist based in Tāmaki Makaurau, Aotearoa. He is renowned for his cast-glass and ceramic sculptures that reference quintessential Kiwi motifs, playing with the idea of nostalgia through familiar, quotidian objects. 

His first candy sculpture paid homage to the humble Jetplane lolly, with brightly-coloured crystal glass being melted down into the shape of the iconic sweet. The accompanying slip cast porcelain ‘paper’ sleeve resembles the crumpled $1 bags he remembers carrying lollies home from the dairy in.

These works elicit a sense of childlike excitement in his clients, who often share their own childhood memories with Wards upon seeing his art. He has built on this visceral reaction by experimenting with scale and enlarging the sweets, the playful shift in size shrinking the viewer into feeling like a kid again.

Although the candy is his best-known work, today Wards’ practice has expanded to include larger sculptures that challenge the boundaries of traditional glass casting techniques. For Wards, the thrill lies not only in the initial conceptualization but also in the ingenuity required to bring his visions to life. Amidst technical innovation and changing mediums his ideas are still, if inadvertently, firmly rooted in nostalgia.