Te Tuhi

Mana wāhine me te wai is an artist panel discussion featuring Alex Monteith, Natalie Robertson, Kahurangiariki Smith and Aroha Yates-Smith. The group discuss the process and kaupapa behind 'Te rerenga pōuri o nga parawhenua ki Te Moana-nui-a-Kiwa', 2019,a large-scale video installation part of Te Tuhi's group exhibition Moana Don’t Cry. The work responds to the mass erosion caused over the past century at Waiorongomai. The artists follow the water flow from mist, rains and streams down the river to the moana. In this discussion, the artists and scholars trace the non-visible threads that bind the work together and significance of Parawhenuamea, the atua (deity) of alluvial waters, in the collaborative work, 'He Tangi Aroha—Mama Don’t Cry', 2019, by Smith and Yates-Smith. Renowned for her work on the Māori divine feminine, Aroha Yates-Smith discusses Parawhenuamea, and her connection to Tangaroa and Hinemoana of the ocean. About the speakers Alex Monteith (b. Belfast, Ireland. Resides Te Piha, Tāmaki Makaurau Auckland, Aotearoa New Zealand) is an artist and senior lecturer at the Elam School of Fine Arts, The University of Auckland, Aotearoa. Her participatory and video works often explore the political dimensions of culture engaged in turmoil over land ownership, history and occupation. Natalie Robertson (Ngāti Porou, Clann Dhònnchaidh, b. Kawerau, Aotearoa New Zealand) is an artist and Senior Lecturer at AUT University, Tāmaki Makaurau Auckland. Robertson’s research and artistic practice draws on historic archives and Ngāti Porou oral customs, by exploring Māori knowledge practices, environmental issues and cultural landscapes, to engage relationships to place. He uri tēnei nō ngā iwi i heke mai ai i runga i ngā waka o Te Arawa, o Tainui, o Takitimu, o Horouta, o Mataatua me ngā iwi hoki i takea mai nei i te whenua nei, i te Ūkaipō, i ngā whenua o Uropi hoki. Aroha Yates-Smith was raised in Rotorua and lives in Kirikiriroa (Hamilton). She was Professor and Dean of Te Pua Wānanga ki te Ao, School of Māori and Pacific Development, at the University of Waikato. Her PhD thesis, entitled Hine! E Hine!: Rediscovering the Feminine in Māori Spirituality, focuses on the role of atua wāhine in Māori cosmology and the marginalisation of the Māori feminine in ethnographic writings and the modern colonised Māori community. Kahurangiariki Smith’s principal focus is on mana wāhine and storytelling, which inform her art and video game development practices. Kahurangiariki’s artworks often employ digital formats, a reflection of the media we engage with, in person and online—gifs, games and karaoke. Image caption: Graeme Atkins, Alex Monteith, Natalie Robertson, with work by Kahurangiariki Smith and Aroha Yates-Smith, Te rerenga pōuri o nga parawhenua ki Te Moana-nui-a-Kiwa, 2019 (install view). Multi-channel video installation. Commissioned by Te Tuhi, Auckland, with support from Auckland University of Technology and University of Auckland. Photo by Sam Hartnett

Artist Charlotte Graham and University of Auckland Professor of Biological Sciences Te Kura Mātauranga Koiora Dr. Mary Sewell they Graham’s work 'Whakawaikawa Moana/Acidic Oceans', 2019. Graham discusses her work in light of scientific research on ocean acidification and the pair both explore scientific solutions to restore balance to our oceans. --- 'Whakawaikawa Moana/Acidic Oceans' is a mirror and text installation that addresses the phenomenon of ocean acidification by summoning the world (AO) and its natural elements under environmental stress. Employing lighting to project words in many directions evoking the multidirectional power of the winds and the sun shimmering on the ocean surface, the work speaks of acidic waters compromising marine life. --- Charlotte Graham (Pare Hauraki, Pare Waikato, Ngāti Kotimana) is an interdisciplinary artist who uses different materials to engage in indigenous dialogue. Graham’s work has addressed social, cultural and political issues for more than twenty years. Dr. Mary Sewell’s recent research has focused on the impact of ocean acidification on early development in sea urchins and green-shell mussels, from habitats including the Hauraki Gulf, Firth of Thames and coastal regions of Antarctica.

Gayle Chong Kwan's immersive installation Wastescape, 2019, weaves thousands of milk bottles into a mesmerising image that reflects our consumer habits, particularly of plastic used by the dairy industry in New Zealand. Exploring the environmental impact of excessive waste, Chong Kwan, alongside fresh water scientist Mike Joy and artist Alex Monteith, discuss the role of artists in building awareness of human responsibility in the pollution of our planet. The discussion will tease out the beauty and brutal reality of an otherworldly landscape made of waste. Wastescape is commissioned by Te Tuhi, Auckland, in partnership with art and environmental organisation Invisible Dust, UK, and the Humber Museums Partnership, UK.

Listen to artists Christina Pataialii, Deborah Rundle, Shannon Novak and Jeff Nusz in conversation with Te Tuhi Artistic Director Gabriela Salgado, 1 December 2018. The artists discuss the development of their new exhibitions at Te Tuhi, alongside the main lines of research that inform their practice. The kōrero is concluded with a Q&A with audience members. About the artists Christina Pataialii’s recent paintings address objective and subjective cultural narratives that focus on more recent global shifts towards cultural and national redefinition, the rise of Western nationalist ideologies and current fixations on regression to a ‘golden era,’ contemplating the concept of a shared national identity. Pataialii graduated with a BFA (2015) and an MFA (2018) from Whitecliffe College of Arts and design. Recent exhibitions include Debt, RM Gallery, 2018;Thoughts and Feelings, mother?, 2018; Projects, Auckland Art fair, 2018; Never an Answer, The Vivian, 2018; Slow Jamz Till Midnight, Blue Oyster Project Space, 2017; The Tomorrow People, Adam Art Gallery Te Pātaka Toi, 2017. Deborah Rundle is an artist living and working in Tāmaki Makaurau. Principally utilising text, she investigates the ways in which power plays out in the social and political domain in order to muse on possibilities for change. Frequently calling up the past, her artworks engage in both a critique of the present, and a lament for the failure of a future once promised. Recent exhibitions include Hybrid Spring, Enjoy Public Art Gallery, Wellington, 2018; March Mostra, BSR Gallery, Rome, Italy, 2018; The Tomorrow People, Adam Art Gallery Te Pātaka Toi, Wellington, 2017; DOWN TIME, Play_station Gallery, Wellington, 2017 New Zealand artist Shannon Novak works with sound and explores contemporary gay issues. He creates compositions for objects, locations, and people much as musicians might compose for/about places, persons, or experiences with emotional resonance for them. Trained initially as a pianist, his practice encompasses painting, sculpture, and installation, with a focus on using geometric forms to explore and render his understanding of the interrelationships between sound, colour, form, time, space, and social context. He also examines the ways in which the plurality and tensions of gay desire muddy and morph geometrical purity and idealism. Jeffrey Nusz is an interactive artist based in Auckland. His installations and online pieces attempt to offer new perspectives on complex and invisible phenomenon through playful interaction. Nusz enjoys collaborations as a way of exploring the creative process of other artists and discovering places neither could reach alone. In 2010, he co-founded Screens, an online gallery for interactive art, which among other work, featured his collaborations with John Ward Knox, Seung Yul Oh and Jae Hoon Lee. As creative lead of the Google Data Arts Team in San Francisco from 2014-2017 he created interactive work with international artists for a global audience. Image: Deborah Rundle Auspices 1943-, 2018 (still) looped digital animation, 15’00” courtesy of the artist

Bringing together a range of practicing artists, academics and researchers, this roundtable discussion explores issues of precarious citizenship, temporary labour and refugee resettlement in Aotearoa. The discussion brings elements of the exhibition 'I Swear' by Bruce Barber at Te Tuhi (13 May - 29 October 2017) into conversation with recent local and global political events and explore their impact upon the colonial legacy of Aotearoa and the Pacific. PANELLISTS Bruce Barber Professor Bruce Barber PhD is an interdisciplinary artist, cultural historian and curator, based in Halifax, Nova Scotia where he teaches courses in Media Arts, Art History and Contemporary Studies at NSCAD University. His art practice has been exhibited internationally and is documented in the publications Reading Rooms and Bruce Barber Work 1970-2008 He is the editor of Essays on Performance and Cultural Politicization and of Conceptual Art: the NSCAD Connection 1967-1973. He is co-editor, with Serge Guilbaut and John O'Brian of Voices of Fire: Art Rage, Power, and the State. Editor of Conde + Beveridge: Class Works (2008); author of Performance [Performance] and Performers: Essays and Conversations (2 volumes) edited by Marc Léger (2008), Trans/Actions: Art, Film and Death (2008) and Littoral Art and Communicative Action (2013). www.brucebarber.ca Pauline Gardiner Barber (chair) Professor of Social Anthropology, Dalhousie University, Canada. Migration specialist working on Philippine global migration. Her most recent project explores the transnational effects of recent major changes to Canada’s “just-in-time” immigration system. Arama Rata (Ngāti Maniapoto, Taranaki, and Ngāruahine) After completing a PhD in Psychology, she lectured in Māori Studies at Victoria University of Wellington. Now at the National Institute of Demographic and Economic Analysis, she has research projects into a variety of Māori issues, including attitudes towards immigration and political participation. Dr Rata is also the Māori spokesperson for MARRC (Migrants and Refugee Rights Campaign). Andrea Merino-Ortiz MA anthropology student interested in the effects of New Zealand’s heavy reliance on volunteers in the resettlement of Columbian refugees. She explores how volunteers affect resettlement, and how refugees engage with volunteer-based assistance in the process of resettlement. Mua Strickson-Pua Reverend Mua Strickson-Pua is a Samoan-Chinese poet born in Aotearoa. He is a Presbyterian minister and community work chaplain practitioner of P.A.T.H. Pasifika Arts for Therapy and Healing at Tagata Pasifika Resources Development Trust serving Pacific nations communities in Auckland for the last ten years. He is also the co-founder of Street Poets Black.

Sasha Huber is a visual artist of Swiss-Haitian heritage. Her work is primarily concerned with the politics of memory and belonging, particularly in relation to colonial residue left in the environment. In 2007, Huber joined the transatlantic committee Demounting Louis Agassiz, initiated by the Swiss historian and political activist Hans Fässler. This long-term project has been concerned with unearthing and redressing the little-known history and cultural legacies of the Swiss-born naturalist and glaciologist Louis Agassiz (1807-1873), an influential proponent of scientific racism who advocated for segregation and “racial hygiene.” Part of the Demounting Louis Agassiz project was included in the 2016 Te Tuhi exhibition Share/Cheat/Unite. An exhibition in three parts, the show delves into the human psyche to consider how altruism, cheating and group formation appear to play a key role in shaping society, but not necessarily in the way we might assume. http://tetuhi.org.nz/whats-on/exhibitiondetails.php?id=171 This talk was presented in partnership with Elam School of Fine Arts, University of Auckland.