Carving that Ngatai Taepa contributed to Te Rau Karamu Marae on Massey University's Pukeahu Campus in Te Whanganui-a-Tara
Māori Development Minister Tama Potaka and Arts Minister Paul Goldsmith recently appointed Professor Taepa as a new trustee on the Te Māori Manaaki Taonga Trust Board. He is Massey University’s Associate Pro Vice-Chancellor (Māori) in the Toi Rauwhārangi College of Creative Arts and one of New Zealand’s leading contemporary Māori artists.
“It's an honour to be asked to sit alongside Arapata Hakiwai and others on Te Māori Manaaki Taonga Trust Board and I’m humbled by this appointment,” Professor Taepa says.
“Of course, with honour comes responsibility. But I am looking forward to our first meeting and contributing to the continuity of Māori creative excellence, and how we might nurture that for future generations.”
Te Māori Tū 40th anniversary. From left: Darcy Nicholas QSM, Sir Herewini Parata, Hinauri Mead, Distinguished Professor Sir Hirini Moko Mead (an original curator), Aroha Mead, Moeahu Reedy, Dame Iritana Tawhiwhirangi. Photographer: Rawhitiroa Photography
The Trust’s current focus is promoting and supporting information exchange, knowledge transfer, and increasing awareness and understanding of taonga Māori.
The Te Māori exhibition that took taonga Māori to four American locations to huge numbers of appreciative visitors in 1984 was a milestone in the Māori cultural renaissance of the 1970s. It toured Aotearoa New Zealand afterwards, again to wide acclaim.
The appointment of Professor Taepa and other new trustees follows the marking of the 40th anniversary of Te Māori this year at Waiwhetu Marae in Lower Hutt – Professor Taepa’s marae.
Elders from the marae, including the late Kara Puketapu, and others such as Sir Hirini Moko Mead, were key drivers of the Te Māori exhibition. Their work, as well as that exhibited in Te Māori, has had a major impact on Professor Taepa’s practice as a Māori artist.
Ngataiharuru Taepa
“I remember as a boy coming to what was then the Dominion Museum in Wellington and seeing Te Māori and being in awe of the taonga. I can still recall the feeling I had being in their presence for the first time and even now, forty years on, I am still inspired by and excited to see them.
“Through Te Māori, people around the world started to become aware of Māori and taonga Māori. The recognition and success of Te Māori on the world stage meant that people back here in Aotearoa had to consider how taonga Māori were thought about and how they were being treated.
“It shifted the museum sector away from its traditional thinking about taonga as curiosities or objects, towards an understanding that for Māori, taonga have a mauri, a life force, and are very special,” he adds.
“Te Māori also had a major impact on our people and for many it sparked their own journey of reconnecting with their cultural identity. It instilled a sense of pride and was a pivotal moment that reaffirmed the brilliance of our ancestors, and the wealth and creative excellence that we have inherited from them.”