The Family in the Van (1953) Oil on board (20 x 26in) Micheal Smither Auckland Art Gallery, Auckland, NZ Recorded March 16, 1999

In this elegiac depiction of postwar life in New Zealand the whispering sound of a deepening afternoon on the plains can be sensed inside of a motionless car. As the memory of a running engine disappears into the air, the unmanned steering wheel and the speechless figures combine to make a silent but vastly unquiet moment.