October 27, 2017
Imagination on display as wars revisited
Ahead of Saturday’s first official observation of Ra Maumahara, the National Day of Commemoration for the New Zealand Wars, Te Papa in Wellington today opens a pop up show featuring taonga from the period.
Puawai Cairns, the acting head of matauranga Maori at the national museum, says the focus is from 1860 to 1872 in Taranaki, Waikato and Tauranga Moana.
Curators Matiu Baker and Dr Rebecca Rice have put together about 15 taonga and 200 digital images that will help develop the national narrative around the day.
"You’ll see some taonga, colonial weapons in particular which tended to be hybrids of European weapons and Maori stylistic embellishments, Maori whakairo, so weapon like the patiti which is a tomahawk and also some amazing artwork from colonial era artists like William Strutt looking at the Pakeha imagination and how they envisaged the wars happening," Ms Cairns says.
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