Printmaker Gary Tricker is known for his whimsical, semi-abstract, slightly surreal images. His childhood spent in rural railway settlements. left him with a life-long passion for trains, railways, black cats, railway clocks, and the New Zealand landscape, which feature in his printmaking across different techniques.

This work, a fantasy-styled composition of children and adults surrounded by toys, quotes a poem by Robert Louis Stevenson XI 'My Wife':
I will make you brooches and toys
for your delight
Of bird song at morning and
starshine at night
I will make a place fit for you
Of green days in forests and blue
days at sea.

Gary Tricker (born 1938, Wellington), worked as a graphic artist for the Tourist, Government Printer and Education Department for 18 years, and has worked as a full-time printmaker since 1976. Tricker has twice won the Queen Elizabeth II Arts Council award. His work has been collected by Auckland Art Gallery and Govett-Brewster Art Gallery in New Plymouth. Gary Tricker lives and works in the Wairarapa.