Hynds Foundation is delighted to welcome Emma Stretch as the 2026 awardee of the Crucible Artist Residency.
Emma is an artist based in Auckland-Tāmaki Makaurau. Her practice to date explores analogue technologies, ecology, language and perceptions of time through sculpture, installation and print. Learning disability and chronic illness have influenced the undercurrents or her conceptual practice, leaning into modes of difference. A fluent printmaker, she has found a parallel between print processes and casting. Both demand care, patience, a slowing down, an impression, layer, removal and touch. She graduated with a Bachelor of Fine Arts in 2024 from Elam School of Fine Arts at the University of Auckland. Most recently, she was part of Artspace Aotearoa’s volunteer group show, Portal (opened 12 February 2026) alongside a cohort of emerging artists.
Emma’s proposed work for the Crucible residency uses walking and mapping as a conceptual and form-making practice.
“Learning about Ōamaru through walking, I will use the shape of my walks in the region to inform the lines of my cast iron objects. These castings would develop into a body of work, abstract and specific to place, a lexicon of movements around Ōamaru.
“All lines and the composition of these cast objects will be an echo of the streets, walking tracks and landscape of Ōamaru itself. I will be acquainting myself with this place, repetitively, over a concentrated period of time, being with place.”
Emma’s residency commences on 24 August and runs for 13 weeks until 22 November. In previous residencies we have hosted two artists but this year we were only able to award a single residency. This was a result of the unexpected and uncertain situation caused in the Middle East, which had a knock-on effect for our funding.
Ruler, 2026
etched aluminum, hook
50 x 600mm