A powerful new Māori-led exhibition is set to make its debut at this weekend’s NZ Art Show in Wellington, showcasing the work of eight emerging and established Māori artists connected to Massey University’s Toi Rauwhārangi College of Creative Arts.
The exhibition, titled Te Reanga Toi Hou, has been created to provide Māori tauira and recent graduates with their first major exhibition experience within one of Aotearoa’s largest national art platforms. Located prominently at the entrance to the TSB Arena show, the initiative places Mātauranga Toi Māori at the centre of the experience, reflecting kaupapa Māori values within a mainstream arts environment.
The project was initiated by NZ Art Show executive director Carla Russell, who envisioned a dedicated space where Māori artists could present their work through a distinctly indigenous lens while engaging directly with wider audiences and collectors.
Curating the exhibition is recent Bachelor of Design with Honours graduate and textile artist Elena Rei, whose practice is grounded in Te Whare Pora traditions including raranga, whatu muka and tukutuku. Rei says the experience of curating inside such a large-scale national exhibition has highlighted the strength of collaborative and mana-enhancing creative practices fostered within Toi Rauwhārangi.
The exhibition also reflects the guidance and mentorship of respected Māori artists Darcy Nicholas and Regan Balzer, both long-standing contributors to the NZ Art Show and influential figures in Māori contemporary art.
The artists featured in Te Reanga Toi Hou represent a broad range of disciplines including photography, sculpture, painting, fibre arts, installation, sound and spatial design. While each artist brings a distinct creative voice, the exhibition is unified through shared connections to whakapapa, whenua, wairua and mātauranga Māori.
Among the exhibitors is Arawhetu Berdinner, whose practice centres on handcrafted taonga made from stone, shell, harakeke and natural pigments. Her adornments draw deeply from whakapapa and ancestral narratives connected to Te Pō.
Artist and kaiako Shannon Clamp explores iwi and hapū knowledge systems through works inspired by pūrākau, taonga tuku iho and local histories, while multidisciplinary artist A.J Manaaki Hope combines painting, assemblage, sound and recycled native materials to investigate identity, whenua and memory.
Angerlia Oliver’s large-scale sculptural works reinterpret Māori creation narratives through layered and woven forms, while photographer Maija Stephens uses lens-based practice to explore decolonisation, Te Taiao and Māori cosmologies through indigenous approaches to photography.
Artist and educator Matt Tini contributes works spanning photography, moving image and native fibres, grounded in Māori cosmologies and reflections on tangata whenua relationships with the environment.
Visual artist and storyteller Ngā Roma Poa focuses on natural pigments and material sovereignty, exploring the relationships between memory, environment and Māori cosmology through process-driven experimentation.
At the centre of the exhibition is curator Elena Rei’s own textile practice, which reimagines ancestral weaving traditions through contemporary forms exploring aroha, grief, reconnection and relationships with ngā atua wāhine.
The exhibition signals growing recognition of Māori creative leadership within Aotearoa’s contemporary arts sector, while also creating pathways for emerging indigenous artists to enter national exhibition spaces with cultural integrity intact.
The NZ Art Show runs this weekend at Wellington’s TSB Arena.
#WaateaNews #MāoriArt #ToiMāori #NZArtShow #TeReangaToiHou #MasseyUniversity #MātaurangaMāori #CreativeArts #ToiRauwhārangi #AotearoaArts #MāoriArtists #WellingtonEvents #NZCulture #ContemporaryMāoriArt
Artists:
Below is a full list of artists exhibiting within Te Reanga Toi Hou.
Arawhetu Berdinner (Te Arawa, Ngāti Whakaue, Ngāti Pikiao)
Taonga are central to Arawhetu Berdinner’s creative practice. Her works are primarily made from hard rock, shell, harakeke, muka and natural pigments. Arawhetu carves, shapes, and weaves each taonga by hand, with processes guided by wairua, the whenua and ngā atua Māori. Her adornments make links to whakapapa; they are portals through time and constantly inspired by stories from the vastness of Te Pō.
Arawhetu holds a Bachelor of Fine Arts with Second Class Honours and is currently undertaking a Master of Fine Arts.
Shannon Clamp (Ngāti Toa Rangatira, Ngāti Koata, Ngāti Tama)
Working as an artist and kaiako, like taniwha flowing between spaces, Shannon Te Rangihaeata Clamp brings forth a creative practice and ways of teaching relying on mātauranga-a-iwi and mātauranga-a-hapū (iwi and hapū knowledge systems). Based on taonga tuku iho, pūrākau and whakapapa, Shannon’s kaupapa reflects on the importance of localised narratives and the mana of pūrākau, iwi, hapū and tūpuna.
Shannon holds a Master of Māori Visual Arts.
A.J Manaaki Hope (Waitaha, Kāti Māmoe, Kāi Tahu; Ngāpuhi, Ngāti Kahu ki Whangaroa, Ngāti Te Ata)
A.J Manaaki Hope is a multidisciplinary artist creating both visual and audio works, moving between painting, whakairo, assemblage and sound. A.J’s journey of self-discovery is the power force behind his creative practice, grounded in whakapapa, whenua and whānau. Using recycled native materials as sculptural elements paired with playfully hung unstretched canvas, A.J engages with the mauri and memory of materials and considers how images can be re-grounded in place.
A.J holds a Bachelor of Fine Arts with Honours.
Angerlia Oliver (Ngāpuhi, Muriwhenua, Ngāti Tūwharetoa, Ngāti Raukawa ki te Tonga)
Whakapapa is central to Angerlia Oliver’s creative practice, with large-scale works assembled by fixing, layering up and weaving together. Her extensive research draws on the rich body of knowledge found in creation narratives within Te Ao Māori which she methodically interprets in therapeutic and introspective ways. Making primarily sculptural works through material experimentation, Angerlia shapes and reshapes her chosen materials while abstractly interpreting ideas of whakapapa.
Angerlia holds a Bachelor of Fine Arts with First Class Honours and a Master of Māori Visual Arts.
Maija Stephens (Ngāti Kahungunu ki Heretaunga, Rongomaiwahine, Ngāti Rangi)
Maija Stephens is a lens-based artist and photographer. The process of decolonisation and indigenisation is an integral part of Maija’s photographic practice. Her work explores issues concerning Te Taiao, Kaitiakitanga, Whakapapa, and Ngā Atua Māori. Through her distinctive engagement with both the camera and her subjects, she reframes her practice with the intent to indigenise the medium of photography itself. Her process is what she likes to describe as ritualistic, constantly drawing from ancestral knowledge to inform how she utilises a contemporary tool.
Maija holds a Bachelor of Design with First Class Honours in Photography
Matt Tini (Waikato, Ngaati Tiipa, Ngaati Mahuta, Ngāti Rākaipaaka, Ngāti Kahungunu)
Matt Tini is an artist and educator at Toi Rauwhārangi College of Cerative Arts who works with photography, moving image, and native fibres. Deeply grounded in whakapapa, Māori cosmologies and contemporary lived experiences, Matt’s practice considers what it means to be tangata whenua in relation with te taiao. These ever-shifting reflections influence Matt’s material and conceptual curiosities.
Matt holds a Bachelor of Fine Arts with First Class Honours and a Master of Fine Arts, First Class Honours.
Ngā Roma Poa (Te Ātihaunui-a-Pāpārangi, Ngāti Maniapoto, Te Whānau- a-Apanui, and Ngāpuhi)
Ngā Roma Poa is a visual artist, storyteller and spatial way-finder. Her practice explores the relationships between environment, memory, and Māori cosmology. Currently focused on the development of natural pigments, including botanical, earth, and shell-based materials. Through this process-driven inquiry, she centres the whakapapa, and material sovereignty of natural resources as critical components of her evolving practice.
Ngā Roma studied a Bachelor of Design with a Spatial Design Major.
Elena Rei (Ngāti Toarangatira, Ngāruahine, Ngāti Koata, Ngāti Tama, Sāmoa)
Elena Rei’s creative practice sits within the realm of Te Whare Pora, weaving together customary and contemporary processes of raranga, whatu muka and tukutuku. Interlaced throughout her works are collective dreams, moments of remembering and profound experiences with the materials she uses. Much of Elena’s practice is intuitive, emulating the ways of her tūpuna and drawing from a visual language that has been woven through time. Her works reimage and make familiar our inherent connection to ngā atua wāhine, through themes of aroha, grief, whakapapa and reconnection.
Elena holds a Bachelor of Design with First Class Honours in Textiles.
