2009 archives

Maynard, of Tasmanian Aboriginal descent, is a documentary photographer who lives on Flinders Island in Bass Strait between Tasmania and the southeast Australian mainland. This exhibition presents his latest developing body of work which he began in 2005, as well as a selection of earlier works from the 1980s and 1990s.

In 1990 Maynard was the recipient of an Aboriginal and Torres Strait Island Arts Board grant which assisted him to undertake a year's full time study as part of the degree program in Documentary Photography at the International Centre of Photography, New York. In 1994 his series No More Than What You See probed indigenous deaths in custody in South Australian prisons and he was awarded the 1994 Mother Jones International Prizes for Documentary Photography and the Human Rights Commission Photography Award. In 2003 he received the Kate Challis RAKA Ward for Indigenous Contemporary Creative Arts for his portrait Arthur. In 2004 he was awarded the Australian Council for the Arts Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander arts board membership.


 
As my body recovers from addictions so does my spirit

FRONTSTAGE
Anoek Steketee
12 December 2008 - 15 February 2009

The west portrays Iranians as people of an oppressive government. But what happens in the actual lives of Iranian people? Steketee was curious about the ordinary images of Iranian people missing from the media so she travelled to Iran to find them. Her photographs strive to reveal their everyday lives as being not so different from our own.

In a series of staged photographic images, she seeks to portray these people in the public spaces of everyday life. Individuals, when forced into uniformity, still manage to preserve their individuality and uniqueness – like the image of young girls looking like Vogue models posing under a larger-than-life image of an ayatollah, or the pair of Converse All Stars peeking out from underneath a burqa.

Anoek Steketee (Netherlands, 1974) trained at the Royal Academy of Art in The Hague and spent a year doing postgraduate master studies at the Academie Sint Joost in Breda. She has exhibited her work in Berlin, Amsterdam, Barcelona, Prague and Wellington. Skeketee was nominated for the Joop Swart Master Class of World Press Photo.

 
Untitled # 5  

OFF THE WALL - Eco Print to art couture
5 -22 Feb 2009

An exhibition containing visually stimulating textile works by Porirua artists including two current Whitireia students Cleo Thorpe Ngata and Olivia Giles, recent graduate Billee Mutton and former student, Rachelle Toimata. The artists have researched and applied eco colour, dies and shibori techniques on wearable arts and textiles.

The concept of the show is to produce contemporary textiles and Wearable Arts cultures based in New Zealand. A DVD has been produced to introduce NZ wearable arts culture showing a range of art forms e.g. dance and performing arts, it then focuses on local textile artists practices.  Whitireia Community Polytechnic student wearable artworks were shown in Philippines with other NZ designers on Waitangi Day 2008. Local works developed with mentoring from Suzanne Tamaki and Kohai Grace have made their entries into Westfield Style Pasifika and Montana WOW.  An original sound track has been developed for this project by WCP design technician Abby Richardson with additional textile work that demonstrates the versatility of the artists involved. This DVD was shown at the International Shibori Symposium in France in November 2008, along with textile works by student Cleo Thorpe Ngata and presentations by Textile Design tutor Deb Donnelly.

                 SHADI GHADIRIAN,

                 
         
         MOHAMMADREZA MIRZAEI, People

        
        MEHRAN MOHAJER, Undistributed packages

The exhibition is a Gold Coast City Art Gallery initiative. Gallery curator Mandana Mapar was born in Iran, raised in New Zealand and is now based in Queensland. She has drawn together 18 photo media artists for this project, most of whom still live and work in Iran (although many exhibit widely overseas).

Eh! Iran allows us to see at first hand what contemporary Iranian photography is like as is emerges from within that culture, not at one remove. Although most of the photographers and filmmakers represented here have travelled and exhibited extensively outside of their country, most were trained in photography at Tehran's Azard University and their imagery (which is produced in Iran) is not stereotypically Persian. By this I mean that Mandana and her colleague have chosen photomedia images that do not necessarily cater to popular expectations. It is non-conformist and challenging.

MORE


 
PEYMAN HOUSHMANDZADEH, Time



HANA MIRJANIAN, Shelves Drug Store

POSITIVELY CREATIVE CULTURE

16 Feb - 15 March 2009

An exhibition from the staff of the Porirua City Council.


Crowned, Kylie Fyfe

          Driftwood Lead Lights, Bill Inge

  
  Nik Bullard, Retro Red

  LOCAL COLOUR

  19 March - 5 April 2009

  A group show from local 
  artists who are seeing red!

  
        Radha Sahar, Local Colour                                                                    Peter Deckers, Yo-Yo Commodity Brooch

AU CONTRAIRE
9 - 26 April 2009

Au Contraire is an exhibition of quilted works that have been selected by the Coastal Quilters group. The quilts are from members within the Coastal Quilters group.

                                      Nadine Smith, The Gatherer


 
  Vivien Atkinson, Puzzle Pieces

THRIFT
Four Quilters
Anna Prussing, Kathy Morrison, Esther Woollaston, Heather Harding
21 February - 17 May 2009

A fascination with the hand-made seems to be sweeping the country, one of the reasons perhaps for the resurgence of interest in quiltmaking in New Zealand in the 21st century. Environmentally conscious consumers are abandoning excess and seeking unique, authentic products with the ‘look of the hand’. Quilts have traditionally been made by hand by stitching scraps of cloth together into pleasing patterns – a thrifty occupation indeed. 

As the global financial crisis worsens and people try to live and work in more sustainable ways, the lessons of the ‘do-it-yourself’ generations seem more pertinent than ever. During thirty years of  depression and war, ‘our parents and grandparents met adversity with thrift, and nowhere is this more enduringly evident than in antique textile art.’1 

The traditional quilt has been given a new contemporary vocabulary, as quilters rediscover its potential as a form of self-expression. Yet quilters continue to create their work from recycled fabrics _ ‘making do’ with found textles. The four quilt artists showcased in this exhibition create unique contemporary art quilts from recycled materials – old bedspreads, curtains, clothing and blankets. Katherine Morrison creates bold, abstract quilts from recycled New Zealand blankets. Esther Woollaston scours op shops for recycled fabrics that have been softened by age. Anna Prussing takes great pleasure in using old clothing bought from the op shops in her community, while Heather Harding seeks out discarded remnants of silk and satin. Implicit in their work is a rejection of mass consumption and an awareness of environmental sustainability.

For Morrison, Prussing and Woollaston, the artistic process involves the retrieval of meaning from textile art. Morrison often uses old hospital and wartime blankets – material already heavy with emotional weight. Recycling New Zealand blankets and sheets reinforces her sense of place and identity. Prussing associates quiltmaking with personal memory and family heirlooms. Her finely stitched, memory-laden quilts are made to celebrate personal rites of passage for her extended family. Woollaston creates quietly eloquent, meditative quilts that are rooted in her life experience. Her abstract quilts, in a restricted palette of subtle subdued colours inspired by nature, are intended as metaphors for the ‘interior life’. Heather Harding's monochrome whole-cloth quilts pay homage to the beauty of traditional Welsh quiltmaking, evoking nostalgia and comfort.

These four Wellington quilt artists are creating works inspired by history and tradition but with contemporary messages, while firmly grounded in the art of making do.


       Esther Woollaston, The Beautiful Blue Light in my Bones 2007

          Heather Harding, Welsh Gold, Detail 2008

THERE ARE PLACES I REMEMBER
Ian Taylor

30 April - 24 May

Ian Taylor was born and brought up on a council housing estate called Dormanstown in Redcar on the edge of the Tees estuary. Ian’s father, upon returning from active service in the mid 1940’s, had secured work in one of the many steel rolling mills close to that large housing complex. This development was modern and well laid out in an open setting with front and rear gardens to the houses and green open spaces. Ian was very happy there for this was an optimistic time for many. The war had had a huge impact on the people of Great Britain. A sense of a certain freedom and general goodwill prevailed which was picked up by many youngsters of Ian’s generation.This sense of great possibility erupted in the early 1960’s through the fashion and music revolutions spearheaded by the Beatles and the Merseyside sound. As a certain prime minister was quoted as saying,”You’ve never had it so good”.

I simply mention this because Ian as an artist is most powerfully driven and inspired by his early life, by the warmth and comfort of a close knit family life so tragically broken by the loss of this father when he was sixteen. Ian’s early love of art was instilled by Rod Stone, his art master at school. Early on in his life Ian knew he wanted to be an artist and to this end he held many jobs until finally he was able to attend art school’s in Middlesbrough, Sheffield and Ruskin School at Oxford University. Ian’s way of life quickly became ruled by the need to paint. His is a serious passion highly informed by the history and traditions of Western European painting. While having a deep appreciation  of the modern movement from the impressionists onwards he also holds a profound appreciation of many of the great classical painters from Titian through Rembrandt and Goya to Delacroix and Ingres. As an art student his abiding inspiration was Paul Cezanne who many consider to be the founder of the modern art movement. 

One of the most important aspect of Ian’s work the creation of, large, free painted “ideas” pieces. These works frequently evoke his past in England. Dormanstown and the works, his neighbours and friends, the football he played and the music he listened to, all feature strongly. Perhaps however the most important reference is to the movies he watched in his youth. The carefully constructed compositions of a John Ford film are not lost on Ian. His desire to create something similar in paint, the balanced, layered structure, self evident in the great movies, gives these pieces a considerable originality.  

                                                  42nd St
                   
                                         The cross and the olive tree
      
                                                  Nga-keri-kapia

REFLECTION : Battle of Crete 1941 - Manos Nathan

9 May - 1 June

Approached by the New Zealand Olympic Committee in 2004, Manos Nathan, of Maori and Cretan ancestry, was asked to create an artwork to celebrate the connection between New Zealand and Greek people. Nathan made an Ipu Whenua which was buried at the Phaleron Allied War Cemetery by the New Zealand Olympic team. During the burial ceremony kokowai from Nathan's papakainga was sprinkled into the vessel to represent the blood shed by the N.Z. Armed Forces in defence of Crete.

In May 2006 Nathan participated in a pilgrimage to Crete with surviving members of the 28 Maori Battalion and other New Zealand servicemen, attending the 65th Battle of Crete commemorations. The pilgrimage included visits to battle sites and urupa; memorial services and civic functions to honour the veterans. "A special occassion for me was the unveiling of a plaque acknowledging the efforts of my grandfather, his whanau and the villagers of Sklavopoula for their support given to Allied Soldiers during the invasion" says Nathan. In recent months Nathan has been assisting Patricia Grace with research regarding Crete during WW2, particularly as it relates to his parents story. 

The convergence of these three things, the Olympic Commission, the 2006 pilgrimage and the biography have all served to re-ignite Nathan's interest in the Battle of Crete, its relevance to our nation and to the 28th Maori Battalion in particular and to encourage him to honour his whakapapa (family) connection to Crete and to those historical events. The time seems right to reflect on this history and Nathan's relationship to it through his art work.

"I wish to create a body of celebratory and commemorative works inspired by those past and present events" says Nathan.


Supported by Te Waka Toi

                            Whakamaharatanga  I

                       The cross and the olive tree

FACE VALUE
Photography and film installation by Serena Giovanna Stevenson.
14 February – 7 June 2009

Expressed through photography and film, Face Value conveys the intimacy of Māori facial moko (tattoo) through six personal stories.

Face Value compels us to be drawn into the everyday space and profound moments before, during, and after the intensely personal process of ta- moko, as seen through the eyes of photographer and multi-media artist Serena Giovanna Stevenson.

Face Value looks at facial ta- moko in its unique environment – absorbing the viewer’s attention but refraining from entering into the history, specific cultural knowledge or politics of moko. The scenes are of real people in their homes, familiar spaces, both indoors and outdoors: we experience the sincerity, human impulse and gaze of understanding passing through the eyes of one generation to the next – from grandfather to grandchild, daughter to mother and on and on.

The images – an otherwise simple capture of people, settings and landscapes - reveal themselves to be precious steps along the journey that follows the recipient receiving his or her facial moko from the ta- moko artist, surrounded by the love of family and friends.


Mera Penehira, Tu Te Kiha Penehira-Hawke and
Kararaina Penny, Titirangi, Ta-maki Makaurau, Auckland, 2006

DELHI DRAWINGS
Denys Watkins
14 March - 21 June 2009

Delhi Drawings were conceived and executed while on a residency in Sanskriti Kendra in South Delhi. The works are painted with oxides and paints on handmade paper, all of which were sourced from local markets. The drawings were constructed without preconception from everyday objects sourced from the nearby Mehrauli Market which traded in domestic wares, kitchen appliances,  haberdashery, fruit & vegetables, spices, household paints, plumbing and building materials.

WELLINGTON WOODTURNERS GUILD
9 July - 2 August

TURNINGS PLUS, Woodcraft produced by members of the Wellington Woodturners Guild.

The 'Guild of Woodworkers, Wellington Inc.' consists of approximately 120 members from the greater Wellington Region.  The Guild's aim is to provide a forum for those interested in working with wood to meet together and to develop their skills and knowledge.  This is the 4th year of the Turnings Plus exhibition, and the second year it has been held at Pataka. 

For the duration of this stunning exhibition, the Wellington Guild of Woodworkers will be demonstrating the use of lathes and
woodturning techniques with in-gallery wood-turning demonstrations. 

LEONARD RIDGWAY'S OLD-TIME CIRCUS
Animated boxes by Grant Tilly
4 July - 4 August
 
Following on from Grant Tilly's highly successful exhibition last year of decorated boxes, Tilly has created a series of 10 new boxes that take a look at the theme of the old time circus.

Pull out the drawers, open the cupboards and watch the lions and elephants rear up, the kangaroos box and the 'Amazing Acrobatic Arial Performers' in action.

                                                       The Horns of History.

1839 EXCHANGES
Jewellery by Jason Hall
30 May - 9 August 2009

Since 1998 Jason Hall's jewellery has been asking questions about what it means to be Pakeha. 1839 Exchanges, Jewellery by Jason Hall is an exhibition about jewellery, identity and cultural exchange. Most cultures have made use of the amulet where commonly a tooth or a claw is strung up or worn to protect the wearer from harm. Hall's jewellery uses the amulet to talk about the anxieties of being Pakeha. These are ambiguous objects - it is not always clear who is protected by Hall's amulets, or what terrors they are intended to fight off.

The exhibition features a series of amulets created for Frederick Edward Manning, an Irishman who arrived in Aotearoa in 1833 and became a trader. Manning was a well known Pakeha Maori who initially advised Maori not to sign the Treaty of Waitangi, later became a land court judge in the 1860's and a member of the European colonial gentry.


Turning the Table, 2007

ORIENTATE : re-imagining customary forms 
8 August -  6 September

Kerry Ann Lee, Sarak Vone Sum and Spring Rees are Asian New Zealand artists who negotiate, revise and make transactions to explore the potential of artwork situated between two cultures.

Kerry Ann Lee works in mixed media, Sarak Vone Sum in painting, and Spring Rees in jewellery.

 
  Joanna Langford, Beyond Nowhere 2007 - 2009

  
  Peter Madden, The Leaving 2008
  Chartwell Collection, Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tamaki, 2009

 
  Eve Armstrong, Run Off 2007
  Chartwell Collection, Auckland Art Gallery, Toi o Tamaki


  

SECONDLIFE
Five Artist projects
27 June - 11 October 2009

The recycling of everyday materials into art is experiencing a resurgence in popularity among artists, but with a fresh contemporary message. Against a backdrop of an overheating planet and rapidly depleting resources, it is hardly surprising that a new generation of artists should create art designed to make their concerns about the environment visible.

Eve Armstrong, Judy Darragh, Niki Hastings-McFall, Joanna Langford and Peter Madden respond to the call to conserve resources and live more responsibly, ‘upcycling’ everyday materials and ready-made objects (objets trouvés), giving them a ‘second life’ as works of art. Modern-day alchemists, the artists magically transform the old into the new - creating works of great beauty and imagination from cheap, humble materials.

While Eve Armstrong reuses and reconfigures cast-off material within new contexts, the others transform their material through renewal and reinvention. Objects transplanted from the realm of the mundane to that of the aesthetic transcend their everyday purpose. They also carry a subtle political message.

By creating art from the detritus of contemporary consumerist culture, artists can reflect their concerns about the negative impact of that culture and emphasise the importance of recycling, while maintaining a sustainable art practice. By extending the life cycle of their materials, they can inspire others to be less wasteful and more creative, without resorting to preaching.

Helen Kedgley
Senior Curator Contemporary Art


Judy Darragh, Plonk 2007
Courtesy of the artist and Two Rooms Gallery

 
  Niki Hastings-McFall, Crucifixion 2009
  Collection of the artist

A CHARITABLE DEED – A COMMENDABLE ACT
The story of the Pauatahanui Burial Ground
15 August - 24 November 2009

The Pauatahanui burial ground was established in 1856 by a Deed of Trust. Thomas Hollis Stace gave the land to be used as a Protestant burial ground and chapel for a sum of five shillings. The land had a colourful history including being an early pa site, then later the pa of  Te Rangihaeata, the fighting chief of Ngati Toa. Later it became the barracks for Imperial troops who were involved in building the road over the Paekakariki Hill Road.

The protestant chapel, built on the land in 1857, was demolished in 1908. St Alban's Anglican Church was built on an adjacent site in 1896. The burial ground passed into the care of the Porirua City Council in 2007 with the passing of a special Act in Parliament.  This exhibition traces the history of the site and celebrates the passing of the Pauatahanui Burial Ground Act.

            
     Monica McCormack,                                 Marian Weststrate, 'Ketting' necklace '
     'Women Cross' ceramic 

    
     Bridey Farrell, Wallpaper 2b

        
                                                    Brian Hill, Semi Disc

                  
                              Alan Wehipeihana, Tree Coffee and Janola     

   EMERGING ARTISTS, LOCAL INTEREST GROUPS AND MORE, THIS IS OUR GALLERY FOR THE COMMUNITY:

       
    Alan Tawhi Amopiu, Steel and Bone,                    Derek Molnar, Woven Grasses
    3D animation

 WHITIREIA POLYTECHNIC Purapura Whetu: Myriad of Stars
27 November 2009 - 10 January 2010

An exhibition of Whitireia's Visual Arts and Design Degree course senior students final years' work, including printmaking, painting, photography, bone carving and jewellery.

Spokesperson, senior student Anna Nelson says Purapura Whetu: Myriad of Stars is a vibrant exhibition of diverse and dynamic works.

"These art works are the culmination of a year of experimentation and hard work by degree students in their second and third years.  It's a good opportunity for anyone  interested in art to see what's on offer".

MUA KI MURI
Intergenerational Creativity
7 October 2009 - 7 February 2010

6 contemporary Maori artists

Mua ki Muri/ Intergenerational Creativity showcases the work of six of New Zealand's leading contemporary Māori artists – Bob Jahnke, Shane Cotton, Kura Te Waru Rewiri, Ngataiharuru Taepa, Rachael Rakena and Israel Birch - all connected by teaching roles at Te Putahi-a-Toi, the School of Māori Studies at  Massey University. Working alongside each other, the six artists have created a strong, intergenerational artistic community - diverse in whakapapa and art practice and informed by both the local and the global. These artists, and Te Putahi-aToi, have become an influential force in New Zealand's artistic life.

The exhibition illuminates the strength of contemporary Māori art. The six artists are conscious of participating in – and contributing to - the continuum of Māori art. Central to Māori culture is the idea of lineage or whakapapa – the passing of knowledge, expertise and values from one generation to another. Mentorship and  manakitanga is seen as a fundamental responsibility. Te Putahi-a-Toi, through these artists, has indigenised the practice of teaching contemporary art, imbuing it with a commitment to Māori culture and Te Reo - enabling a modern and evolving expression of indigenous concepts. 


Rachael Rakena, One man is an island [He Waiata Whaiaipo Series] 2009
Courtesy of the artist and Bartley + Company Art

   
Bob Jahnke, Roses for Wittgensteini II, 2009        Israel Birch, Tukarangi 2008 
Collection of Massey University                            Collection of the artist, 
Albany Art Collection                                           courtesy of Page Blackie Gallery

  PETER ADSETT
  MATAWHERO: BULLET HOLES AND BANDAGES
  28 November 2009 - 14 March 2010

Peter Adsett has exhibited widely throughout Australia, Japan, the US and New Zealand. He has built a considerable career as an accomplished  and distinctive abstract artist.

Peter Adsett has taken one of the most arresting events in Tairawhiti history and declined to talk about it. Instead, through his decades-long experimentation with abstraction, the Melbourne-based artist invites the viewer to “seek out the edges”, to try to make their own sense out of the 1868 Matawhero Massacre.

Not that his exhibition, Matawhero: Bullet Holes & Bandages, is about the massacre per se. What it’s about, he says, is the process of painting – about the language of abstraction, the responses of Western artists to “spaces” in indigenous art and, most importantly, how black and white are never actually black and white. In the past Adsett has, in exploring his craft, dealt with issues from decay (in the 2005 exhibition More Rot) to the potential vitriol of colour (Polychrome Poison, 2002).

Fittingly, though, there is a sense of violence in the Matawhero series. Or rather, as the artist puts it, there is “violation” in the damaged surfaces of the 25 canvases. The thick bristles that are torn from his brush as he paints are incorporated into the works. As are other pock-like contaminants that, to a wondering eye, might be interpreted as bullet holes. “What first occurs to me when I think about Matawhero is that it was a violation,” the Gisborne-born artist said. “These paintings, too, have in a way been violated. Their surfaces have been destroyed.” He says his relationship with Matawhero, and with people who live there, was the reason why it took him 30 years to offer his visual response to its history.

NOTE: The 'Matawhero Massacre' refers to the 1868 incident when Maori prophet Te Kooti Arikirangi Te Turuki and his followers killed around 60 people - roughly equal numbers of Maori and Pakeha. The attack was said to be vengeance for Te Kooti’s treatment after his capture at Waerenga-a-hika three years earlier (SOURCE: NZ History). 

  

 
   Click below for Peter Adsett's talk about his exhibition Matawhero: Bullet Holes and Bandages

  

    NOTE: PCC staff and some organisations may not be able to view this video if their organisations do not allow video streaming.

LORENE TAUREREWA
SLEIGHT OF HAND
21 November 2009 - 7 February 2010

Finding inspiration in the stories of her Samoan, Chinese and European ancestors, Lorene Taurerewa weaves her personal and historical family narrative into her large-scale drawings.

In this new series of figurative, charcoal works, Sleight of Hand, begun during her recent residencies in New York and Seoul, Taurerewa focuses on stories from her mother's childhood.

Combining an intense and powerful presence with a subtle, emotional complexity, the monumental drawings present themselves as alternative psychological worlds. Dressed in Victorian dresses, the imposing, life-size figures that confront the viewer seem caught between childhood and adulthood - uncertain, apprehensive and vulnerable. Solitary figures, they interact with a variety of exotic pets and toys. In some of the drawings mysterious, spirit-like figures evoke the presence of family ancestors.

By contrast, her small works on paper and canvas are delicate and intuitive - visual fragments of narrative stories.

Taurerewa's drawing technique has been influenced by her study of traditional Chinese painting. She consciously sets up an ambiguous space with subtle shifts of scale and spatial depth, contrasting the inky charcoal marks with empty spaces.

Click here for Lorene's personal statement on the works in this exhibition

               
               Madeleine Casey, Kehua
                          

              
               Brian Gunson, Te Heke Tahutahu-Ahi

               
          
          
          
          
          
          All above photographs by Evan McBride

   PORT NICHOLSON HANDWEAVERS
   16 January - 14 February 2010

      

LIGHT & SHADOW drawings by Catherine O'Donnell 20 February - 14 March  Large scale charcoal drawings by award winning artist Catherine O'Donnell, a resident of Blacktown, Porirua's Sister City in Australia.

Peter Adsett has taken one of the most arresting events in Tairawhiti history and declined to talk about it. Instead, through his decades-long experimentation with abstraction, the Melbourne-based artist invites the viewer to “seek out the edges”, to try to make their own sense out of the 1868 Matawhero Massacre.

Not that his exhibition, Matawhero: Bullet Holes & Bandages, is about the massacre per se. What it’s about, he says, is the process of painting – about the language of abstraction, the responses of Western artists to “spaces” in indigenous art and, most importantly, how black and white are never actually black and white. In the past Adsett has, in exploring his craft, dealt with issues from decay (in the 2005 exhibition More Rot) to the potential vitriol of colour (Polychrome Poison, 2002).

Fittingly, though, there is a sense of violence in the Matawhero series. Or rather, as the artist puts it, there is “violation” in the damaged surfaces of the 25 canvases. The thick bristles that are torn from his brush as he paints are incorporated into the works. As are other pock-like contaminants that, to a wondering eye, might be interpreted as bullet holes. “What first occurs to me when I think about Matawhero is that it was a violation,” the Gisborne-born artist said. “These paintings, too, have in a way been violated. Their surfaces have been destroyed.” He says his relationship with Matawhero, and with people who live there, was the reason why it took him 30 years to offer his visual response to its history.

NOTE: The 'Matawhero Massacre' refers to the 1868 incident when Maori prophet Te Kooti Arikirangi Te Turuki and his followers killed around 60 people - roughly equal numbers of Maori and Pakeha. The attack was said to be vengeance for Te Kooti’s treatment after his capture at Waerenga-a-hika three years earlier (SOURCE: NZ History). 

  

 
   Click below for Peter Adsett's talk about his exhibition Matawhero: Bullet Holes and Bandages

  

    NOTE: PCC staff and some organisations may not be able to view this video if their organisations do not allow video streaming.