Leading Maori artists feature in Wellington Matariki festival
City Gallery Candice Breitz
Major exhibitions by leading Māori artists feature at Wellington galleries during the Wellington Matariki Festival which opens next week.
Eight of Wellington’s museums and art galleries are presenting the Wellington Matariki Festival featuring more than 60 free events and activities between Saturday 13 June to Sunday 12 July.
Major exhibitions by leading Māori artists feature at Wellington galleries during the Wellington Matariki Festival which opens this week.
Eight of Wellington’s museums and art galleries are presenting the Wellington Matariki Festival featuring more than 60 free events and activities between Saturday 13 June to Sunday 12 July.
Acclaimed artist Darcy Nicholas is one of 25 leading Te Atiawa artists featuring at Waikanae’s Mahara Gallery exhibition He Toi Reikorangi which runs from 13 June to 12 July. The artists all share whakapapa and works range from traditional to contemporary pieces.
Also at Mahara Gallery, three taa moko artists – Mitchell Hughes, Rangi Kipa and Taryn Beri – demonstrate their work on Saturday 13 and Sunday 14 June.
Te Tini A Pitau: Ngataiharuru Taepa, 12 years of Kowhaiwhai highights the work of contemporary artist Ngataiharuru Taepa at Pataka Art + Museum in Porirua from Sunday 14 June. Considered one of New Zealand’s most important and innovative contemporary artists, Taepa has been working on restoring kowhaiwhai panels since he was a teenager and for the past 12 years has focued on kowhaiwhai patterns in his work experimenting with a range of new technologies including computer-generated imagery, digital routers, acrylic laminates and stencial on PVC pipes and steel.
Pataka Art + Museum also presents exhibitions by renowned weaver Kohai Grace and students (until 28 June) and ceramic artist Wi Taepa Playing With Colour (11 June – 12 July).
Communication is at the heart of an exhibition by self-taught artist Susan Te Kahurangi King and video/performance artist Shannon Te Ao at City Gallery. King (64) stopped speaking at around the age of five years, but draws endlessly and inventively using graphite, coloured pencils, pastels and inks; while Te Ao uses found language and embeds it into performed actions and gestures. Susan Te Kahurangi King | Shannon Te Ao: From the one I call my own runs from Saturday 27 June.
Wellington artist Sandy Rodgers work features in The Deep Night at Expressions Whirinaki from 11 June to 19 July.
Te Papa has two exhibitions in Ngā Toi | Arts Te Papa that highlight remarkable Māori stories. Ngāti Toa Rangatira: He iti whetū showcases Ngāti Toa stories of encounters in the colonial years of Aotearoa New Zealand. Two Artists contrasts the striking work of Emily Karaka and Shona Rapira Davies, ground-breaking Māori artists who rose to prominence in the mid-1980s.
Also at Te Papa, local aerosol artists will transform a wall in the underground parking lot on Thursday 18 June. Juse1, Kerb, and Spex will take their inspiration from Te Papa’s Māori and Pacific collections, as well as the museum’s Matariki 2015 theme: ‘He rau tangata, he kōingo aroha | People gather and affirm love in myriad ways’.
A major new installation work has been created for The Dowse Art Musuem in Lower Hutt and is on display throughout Matariki. Reweti Arapere’s giant tiki figure Rangimatua (Sky Father) stands four stories tall and explores customary Māori narratives.
The exhibitions are highlighted during Art Night on Thursday 2 July, when six of the eight museums and galleries will be open late with free transport and special events and performances.
The Wellington Matariki Festival 2015 runs from Saturday 13 to Sunday 12 July. For full details of events, visit www.wellingtonmatariki.org
WE GRATEFULLY ACKNOWLEDGE SUPPORT FROM THE WELLINGTON REGIONAL AMENITIES FUND:
Hutt City Council, Kāpiti Coast District Council, Masterton District Council, Porirua City Council, Upper Hutt City Council, Wellington City Council
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