In 1991 Wilkinson received a Diploma in Craft Design and in 2001 she completed a Bachelor of Design from Unitec Institute of Technology, where she studied under the esteemed Pauline Bern. In 2014 she completed a Doctor of Philosophy in Fine Arts at Te Pūtahi-ā-Toi School of Māori Art, Knowledge and at Massey University in Palmerston North.
Wilkinson has been a practicing jeweller for over 20 years and her work explores customary Māori adornment while pushing the boundaries of contemporary New Zealand jewellery practices. "Her work emerges from the encounter of two things: contemporary jewelry, which she would define as a critical studio craft practice which makes objects that are grounded in an awareness of the body. And Maori systems of knowledge, which place people in specific relationships to each other and to the world and which sometimes use objects to mediate these connections." Wilkinson has exhibited nationally and internationally and has work in both private and public institutions including Te Runanga-o-Ngāi Tahu, The Dowse Art Museum, Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa and The Auckland War Memorial Museum.
On February 28, 2016, Wilkinson gave a lecture with Alan Preston at the Pinakothek die Moderne in Munich Germany.
2015 Recipient of the Creative New Zealand Craft/Object Fellowship 2012 Guest Judge for the Objective Art Awards 2012 Auckland Council Manukau Arts Centre 2004 Aotearoa /New Zealand Maori Delegation for 9th Festival of Pacific Arts in the Republic of Palau. 2002 Commissioned by Ngāi Tahu to make a gift for Queen Elizabeth who visited a Ngāi Tahu marae whilst on a Royal New Zealand Tour.
The result was a brooch called Aoraki Lily that was made from family heirloom white heron kotuku feathers in the shape of the native flower, a Mount Cook Lilly. Megan Tamati-Quennell, Archives – Te Wāhi Pounamu, Areta Wilkinson and Mark Adams, Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa, 22 December 2015 Mark Amery, Show me your motion, The Big Idea, 26 August 2015 Interview with Areta Wilkinson, The Dowse Art Museum podcast, August 2015 The Dowse Art Museum.
Richard Bell, The Third New Zealand Jewellery Biennial: Turangawaewae: A Public Outing, 1998.
Deborah Crowe. The Dowse Art Museum, 4th New Zealand Jewellery Biennale: Grammar: Subjects and Objects, 2001. In Conversation with Areta Wilkinson, Art Jewelry Forum, September 2015.
2015 ARCHIVES Te Wahi Pounamu (with Mark Adams), Dunedin Public Art Gallery 2014-2015 Whakapaipai: Jewellery as Pepeha, Canterbury Museum, Christchurch. Objectspace, Auckland. The Dowse Art Museum, Lower Hutt. 2012 Pepeha Bartley and Company Art, Wellington 2012 Collecting Contemporary, Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa 2003 Te Puāwai o Ngāi Tahu: Twelve contemporary Ngāi Tahu artists", Christchurch Art Gallery.
