Māori to reclaim voice at museum
The Canterbury Museum waited four years before it addressed complaints about its dioramas depicting Māori moa hunters.
The exhibit, the only representation of Māori in the museum, includes three dioramas with one showing a man sketching on a wall with a rock, a woman hunched over cooking and a child drinking from a container.
In March the glass casing of the first diorama was partially frosted to obscure the view and an apology appeared beside it.
Two similar dioramas in the same area have not been obscured. One depicts two men hunting moa, and the other shows two men starting a fire while a woman fishes. The exhibits were based on decades of the museum’s research into the Mā ori moa hunting period. Two were based on the Gowan Hill area, near Oxford, where traces of moa bones were found in limestone shelters. The exhibit opened in 1992.
Canterbury Museum Board member representing Ngāi Tahu, Puamiria Parata-Goodall, said iwi liaison committee Ōhākī O Nga Tipuna began raising concerns about the diorama ‘‘at least four years ago’’.
‘‘The Ōhākī does not support the keeping of those dioramas. They do not tell our Mā ori story. They tell a story that has been researched and curated from a museological background.
So it’s not the voice of the indigenous people, it is not a Ngāi Tahu voice, it is not an iwi Māori voice that speaks out of those dioramas.’’
Last year the committee recommended the removal of the exhibit in a ‘‘stepped’’ process given the museum’s financial and resource constraints.
Parata-Goodall said she does not know if any attempt to consult with NGĀI Tahu when the exhibit was developed in the 1980s was made.
The exhibit was widely ‘‘detested because they portray early Māori as Neanderthals who lived in caves and had very little technology’’.
‘‘That is not an accurate portrayal of my ancestors and it locks them in that space. It leaves us hanging back there as though we disappeared. And we didn’t disappear, we’re still here.’’
Ngāi Tūāhuriri Upoko Dr Te Maire Tau said iwi were not consulted over the exhibit.
‘‘I think it is a disgraceful depiction of our ancestors.’’
He said while his people may have taken shelter in caves they also built whare and marae.
The museum had committed to the dioramas’ removal but no time frames were set, Parata-Goodall said.
The museum’s redevelopment would mean Māori could ‘‘get their voice back’’.
‘‘Ngāi Tahu, Ngāi Tūāhuriri and the Christchurch hapu will drive that discussion about what story will be told and how will it be told in the new museum.’’
Canterbury Museum director Anthony Wright said the ‘‘outdated’’ dioramas ‘‘had the potential to mislead some visitors because they only told a small part of a long and proud story of Aotearoa’s first people’’.
‘‘There is little recognition in the galleries that Māori are a living culturally vibrant people.’’
The museum has wanted to ‘‘address the issue’’ since 2001 when planning for a redevelopment first started but delays to the rebuild project, including the 2011 earthquakes, had prevented action on the exhibit,’’ Wright said.
‘‘The proposed redevelopment is an opportunity for Ngāi Tūāhuriri to lead, inform and help design the representation of past and current Māori culture and stories on display, with the help of museum staff.’’
‘‘The Ohākī does not support the keeping of those dioramas. They do not tell our Māori story.’’ Puamiria Parata-Goodall
Canterbury Museum Board member representing Ngā Tahu