Provenance:
Private Collection, Auckland

Reference: p. 47 The Watercolours of Alfred Sharpe, Published, Auckland City Art Gallery, 1973 p. 58 & 61 The Art of Alfred Sharpe, Roger Blackley, Auckland City Art Gallery in association with David Bateman Ltd, 1992.

Exhibited:
Alfred Sharpe Auckland City Art Gallery - 5 March - 16 May 1993
Te Papa Tongarewa - 28 May - 1 August 1993
Dunedin Public Art Gallery - 12 August - 2 October 1993

Illustrated: p. 45 The Art of Alfred Sharpe, Roger Blackley, Auckland City Art Gallery in association with David Bateman Ltd, 1992

Alfred Sharpe's original manuscript label reads: Entrance to Cadman's Creek, Coromandel, by Alfred Sharpe - Price £15.15.0 - This picture is a faithful delineation of the scene, down to the smallest objects - It gives a life like idea of the general appearance of the entrances to the mountain gorges of the Coromandel peninsula; & shows the way in which the stranded logs lie in the creeks, waiting for the next flood to carry them further down towards the booms. On the right bank the timber has been cleared for firewood & the debris burnt off; & the characteristics of the rapidity, are faithfully reproduced - The effects of the fire on the other side are shown in the trees on that side; some dead, and the others recovering - The foreground is closely-cropped grass, mixed with sand patches and tufts of coarser herbage; & littered with debris of the floods that occasionally cover it - The large trees represented are 3 Rewa Rewa, 1 Puriri, 2 Rata, and 1 Hinau - The logs are Kauri, felled miles up the creek, Alfred Sharpe, New Zealand.

Entrance to Cadman's Creek is one of Sharpe's most important watercolours produced in 1880. He painted it for the New Zealand Court of the Melbourne International Exhibition. It was on display for seven months and was one of the largest exhibitions held in Australasia, attended by around 1.5 million visitors.

Roger Blackley refers to Entrance to Cadman's Creek in his book The Art of Alfred Sharpe, Auckland City Art Gallery & David Bateman Ltd, 1992. Late in June (1880) he had the picture framed at De Courcy's, at the junction of Queen and Wakefield Streets, where it was exhibited briefly ('for the inspection of connoisseurs and persons interested in art') before being shipped to Melbourne.

The fllowing appeared in the New Zealand Herald 23 February, 1882 The drawing in the art union of ten water-colour pictures of Auckland scenery, by Mr. Alfred Sharpe, took place yesterday afternoon, at Mr Leech's, Shortland Street. There were 124 subscribers at l0s each, and 10 prizes. The following was the result-1st prize, Sunset in the Kikowhakarere Gorge, Coromandel, Mr Goffe, Waitangi, Bay of Islands; 2nd prize, Entrance to Cadman's Creek, Coromandel, Mr Leech; 3rd prize, A Peep at Coromandel from Whangapoua road, Mr J M Simcox; 4th prize, Up the Parsonage Ravine, Coro-mandel, Mr N G Lennox; 5th prize, Sulphur Islets Coromandel, Mr S M Herapath; 6th prize, On the Coast Near Auckland, Mr J Hall, Kawakawa; 7th prize, Old Windmill at Epsom, W E; 8th prize, Junction of Waikato and Mangawhero Rivers, Blank; 9th prize, Singular Puriri Tree, Coromandel, Mr W Busby, Waitangi, Bay of Islands; 10th prize, The Last of Fort Britomart, Mr Swift, Kawakawa.

The New Zealand Herald 29 June 1880 description is similar to Sharpe's manuscript label. It read: It is an illustration of one of the scenes peculiar to this province, giving the peculiar features of the entrances to the mountain gorges on the Coromandel peninsula with perfect fidelity. The bush on the right hand side has been felled for firewood, and the debris burnt off; and the undergrowth, which springs up with marvellous rapidity on burnt bush land, is well represented. The effects of the fire on the trees on the opposite side, and the way the stranded kauri logs lie in the creeks awaiting the next fresh, are also shown, and the foreground is littered with the debris of various floods that occasionally cover it. The large trees represented are the puriri, rewarewa, hinau, and rata.