Multi-disciplinary artist Julia Holden is better known for her live performance art, clay work and animated paintings so when she started painting pets and animals, it wasn't a turn she saw coming.

A gateway to Tairawhiti East Cape from the north is the town of Ōpōtiki in the Bay of Plenty. As a creative hub local organisation Ōpōtiki Arts has a new leash of life with this year 95 members in their ranks, and since 1977 they've owned their own premises, a historic 1898 hall.

In the new feature film Koka an elder Maori woman, under the celestial guidance of Matariki, makes a long journey home in a car that's seen better days. For Koka's director, Kath Akuhata-Brown of Ngati Porou, this has also been a long journey - to make a film on her own terms.

Good Bitches are still baking across the country and the collective has just released its third cookbook Familiar Foods. But it's not the classics you may be imagining but rather family recipes; some of which have been in the family for generations.

Te Ahu a Turanga is a new $824 million 11.5-kilometre four-lane highway connecting the Lower North Island East to West. It opened this week. it is, in effect an enormous sculpture park you can drive through. Through art, design, pattern and planting it places a cloak across the land, including references in sculpture to instruments of weaving.

To celebrate Matariki, singer-songwriter, TV presenter and political candidate Ria Hall will be on stage with the Auckand Philharmonia to present a night of epic anthems. Her self-titled EP won Best Māori album at the music awards in 2012, blending hip hop beats with rich layers of Te Reo and English. She has since released two more albums; Rules of Engagement and Manawa Wera and has collaborated with many of Aotearoa's leading musicians. Last year she ran for Mayor of Tauranga - where she was born and raised. Ria Hall joins Culture 101 as the Fast Favourites guest.

Does an underground still exist? Or is it just one more consumer choice in an ever growing banquet of ticketed events? Testing this may be Tamaki Makarau's biennial Festival of Live Arts (FOLA), at the Basement Theatre from June 11 to 15.

Each week Culture 101 puts the spotlight on a different part of the country and we're going a bit more suburban this week to West Auckland - and the suburb of Titirangi. Close to the Waitakere Ranges and beaches nearby, the village is surrounded by lush greenery. With scenic reserves, the area became a tourist destination on the fringes of Tamaki Makaurau. Local and filmmaker Robin Kewell joins Culture 101.

Award-winning UK festival Focus Wales celebrates emerging talent and artists. The festival which has been running for 15 years saw more than 22 thousand attendees, showcased 250 artists across 20 stages in various venues around Wrexham.

This month welcomes two contemporary indigenous performing arts festivals which have established themselves as cornerstones of the presentation of new work from Aotearoa and across the Pacific.