"An incredibly diverse and eclectic collection", the Parliamentary Collection has great art, black rods, protest bricks, bodily parts and much more.
A lock of Queen Victoria's hair, an anti-vaccine placard, a specially designed mug from the Beehive's formal opening in 1977, and a large wooden elephant.
These items are part of the Parliamentary Collection, the most notable component of which is a significant art collection which you can see widely on the walls around Parliament.
The art collection includes sub-collections, and these are treasures. The Curator of the Parliamentary Collection, Tasha Fernandez, says a lot of the work that those who visit Parliament notice is by notable artists and comes from the MFAT transfer in the early 90s, when art that was kept in New Zealand's high commissions abroad got brought back home.
"If you look down that corridor and some other parts of the precinct, we've got some absolute stunning (art)... we've got four Colin McCahons - that's pretty exquisite to have - we've got some Frances Hodgkins, some absolutely stunning pieces. We're very lucky," she says.
"An incredibly diverse and eclectic collection", the Parliamentary collection has been going since the 1880s but it wasn't formalised until the 1990s, Fernandez explains.
"We've got protest materials, we've got photography, staff uniforms over the years, building-related materials, and original 1977 carpet from the Beehive."
Fernandez is determined that the public should have the opportunity to experience the Parliamentary Collection which has four and a half thousand items. "There's also twenty-eight paper weights in that!" she adds.
"I'm really careful and conscious (that) the good stuff gets seen. I really, really want lots of people to see this work. So I'm working with an internship programme at the moment. to digitise the collection, and that's really important. So you don't have to be on precinct to look at it."
When offered any item for the collection, she must consider whether it's unique to Parliament and the country.
"The latest acquisitions are related to the big protest (in February/March). And that's important because for the collection to stay relevant it has to reflect our history, and that was a huge part of New Zealand's history. It wasn't a nice part but it was significant."…