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Daniel Mills has painted his way through Naenae in Lower Hutt. His work can be seen on primary schools, the boxing academy, the dentist, the basketball court, the swimming pool, health centre and the subway tunnel.

The Learning Connexion goes for a tour with their former student.

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Naenae has an interesting history: the name can be translated from Maori to ‘mosquito’ or ‘sandfly’, recalling a time prior to the draining of the area when the mosquito population predominated.

After WWII ended in 1945 the Lower Hutt region expanded, and there was an urgent need to build houses for new families. Renowed Austrian Architect/Town-planner Ernst Pliske was called upon to design a utopia of sorts, a suburb where the nuclear family can settle in and grow.

Many people believe his inspiration for Naenae was from Piazza San Marco (St. Mark’s Square) in Venice. He believed if you design a town around a public space that people would animate the town.

Dan Mills was called on by the charismatic Billy Graham (a former New Zealand and Australasian light welterweight boxing champion). Billy is a motivational speaker and he also runs the Naenae Boxing Academy. Billy had a whole lotta rocks on his hands and he asked Dan to paint a series of all the heavyweight boxing champions in the world on the face of the rocks. These now sit surrounding the Boxing Academy.

Dan’s murals have also graced the subway tunnel, the Naenae Dentist, Naenae Primary School, Rata Street School, Naenae Basketball Court, the olympic sized Swimming Pool and the Pacific Health Centre all in Naenae… so in the words of Billy Graham:  ‘He’s a Naenae man now’.

www.danmillspaintings.com

www.youtube.com/danmillspaintings