Yachtsman Sculptor Land Surveyor Author and Heritage Rescue activist Kap Pothan passed away this week just weeks after his 96th Birthday

 

Kenneth Anthony Pothan (known throughout his life by his boyhood acronym Kap) was a well-known figure in Northland in many intersecting spheres of his life. As a distinguished land surveyor town planner and civil engineer he was Whangarei District Surveyor and Chairman of the Northland Surveyors Institute. As Whangarei District Council Property Manager he wrote the original report later adopted by Council and Mayor Semenoff as the Town Basin Heritage Precinct and supervised its construction. This echoed his earlier life in Sydney where he had been appointed Sydney City Council consultant on the Sydney Cove Redevelopment Authority, now known as The Rocks. One of many huge heritage rescue projects he was involved with throughout his life both in NZ and abroad.

Kap began one of the first private land survey practices in the Far North in the 1950’s and was elected a Councillor on the Kaikohe Town Council and Chairman of the Town Planning Committee on Council.. The youngest councillor elected then aged 27. At this time too he was appointed to the Council of the NZ Antarctic Society and the Planning Committee of the UK/NZ TransAntarctic Expedition subsequently appointing Sir Edmund Hillary to lead the expedition. He married Janet Munro in 1952 and two children: Scott in 1954 and Cherie in 1957 followed and they now succeed him and late wives Janet and Bettina.

Kap Pothan studied at the University of Otago and played Representative Rugby for Hawkes’ Bay as his father had done before him. He built designed and sailed his own yachts at Devonport as a boy and subsequently owned heritage sloops and ketches in Sydney, the British Virgin Islands and New Zealand. Sailing was intrinsic to his life. He dined with HM Queen Elizabeth and Prince Phillip aboard HMY Britannia while working for the British Foreign and Commonwealth in the Caribbean for six years as Chief Surveyor.

He held senior executive government positions in Indonesia and in Papua New Guinea before returning to live in Aotearoa NZ in 1982.

Art-making built heritage and writing were predominant forces in his life. He was never a hobbyist at anything he did. His first novel A Time to Die was published in 1967 and he was elected to the Australian Society of Authors. Vintage and classic cars were another passion restoring many famous marques and involved in classic car rallies across the North and South Islands.

He began sculpting in stone early on in Canberra and Sydney, later studying stone carving in Somerset England. Kap exhibited in England, New South Wales and New Zealand from the early 1980’s. A sculpture was bought by the government for Government House and another was commissioned for Reyburn House at the Town Basin Whangarei. His largest work Earth Mother 1987 is now permanently in the grounds of the Arboretum Trust Stillwater Auckland. For many years it was a famous landmark on Hatea Drive Regent outside the family home visible to every commuter driving into town. He was elected a Working Member of the NZ Academy of Fine Arts.

Kap was many years an active trust board member of the Northland Society of Arts guiding its relocation and restoration and the Whangarei Art Museum from its birth in 1997. He was a quiet yet dominating force in the cultural life of Northland for decades. Born during the Great Depression his family lost its farm to the bank and his earliest memories were living in a PWD tent. He grew up during a raging World War was passionate about flying biplanes: athletics rugby and rowing at Takapuna Grammar. Early encounters with racism and religious bigotry shaped his worldview for the rest of his life. In turn he shaped and inspired the lives of many across nations. This love of the world around him, and family, seemed endless. Only ceasing in the care of the lovely people at Whangarei Base Hospital St. Johns Ambulance and subsequently Kamo Rest Home on 24th April 2025.

A private cremation was held on 29th April by Morris & Morris Funerals.

Flowers can be placed at Kap Pothan’s sculpture Lotte Reyburn at Reyburn House Gallery Town Basin Whangarei.  

Written by his son Scott Pothan