About

Three phased project:

TAURAPA - Installed at Whitecliffe.

TAUMANU - Platform active online.

TAUIHU - Public site visit in Waiuku.

Durational project with three parts, all carried out during a period of three months. This project came at the end of a two-year MFA research that looked at the protocols that exist within the boundaries, protocols, and hierarchies that shape how we behave in spaces and interact with them. I focused on the transitions within marae ātea spaces as physical representations of these dynamics, and I turned to whenua and non-human entities as faces to confront and bring forward.

TAURAPA, installed at Whitecliffe, marked the starting point of the project. It served as a static installation, grounding the uku in an institutional space and inviting visitors to reflect on the material’s displacement from its place of origin. This phase represented the sternpost of a waka, emphasizing whakapapa and the connection to origins while navigating institutional protocols.

TAUMANU existed as a platform named ‘rangi,’ reflecting its ephemeral, cloud-like nature. Visitors were invited to engage with this phase online, streaming live, scrolling leisurely, and becoming acquainted with uku from the perspective of Waiuku. The digital platform acted as an intermediary space, encouraging intimate yet distanced engagement with the materiality of uku, as if observing tikanga from a contemporary lens.

TAUIHU concluded the project with a public site visit in Waiuku, inviting participants to return the uku back to its home. This phase represented the prow of the waka, symbolizing forward movement and the ceremonial act of arrival. Through a collective journey via waka, visitors participated in the reciprocal act of returning the material to its source, embodying the cyclical relationship between whenua and the non-human entities involved.