Doing it for their Sisters
A band of Ma¯ ori and Pacific women led the revolution of New Zealand’s art scene,writes Dionne Christian
Aline of little brown plastic dolls, some wearing hula skirts and lei, watch artist and curator Rosanna Raymond as she sits in an armchair — it’s covered with colourful blankets, which look artful rather than old-fashioned — and reminisces about Auckland’s art scene circa 1992.
“You couldn’t be urban and indigenous — don’t be silly,” Raymond says, adopting a tone of mock outrage and ending the assertion with a hearty chuckle.
All around her West Auckland studio — a former wine cellar at Corban Estate Arts Centre — is evidence to the contrary. Flamboyant fabrics and shell necklaces spill out of numerous boxes which are packed tight on overcrowded shelves; vibrant curtains, woven out of plastic raffia, tumble to the floor; two shop dummies wear sharply cut clothes adorned with feathers and patches made from blankets; posters advertise fashion shows of yesteryear and wooden ornaments hide on shelves.
These are the materials that helped revolutionise New Zealand’s art scene when, in the late 1980s and early 1990s, a generation of Pacific and Ma¯ ori fashion designers, artists and performers found each other in the nightclubs and bars of central Auckland.
It’s long been said that change happens at the margins; as these artists formed collectives to work on art and fashion shows, they introduced the groundbreaking style of an urban, New Zealand-born Pacific generation to the mainstream.
Founded in 1991 by dressmaker and designer Selina Haami, fibre artist Suzanne Tamaki and body adornment artist Nephi Tupaea, the Pacific Sisters led the pack. Their innovative costumes and performances, which started as their own “street style”, found their way into clubs, progressive art galleries and on to the catwalk, attracting more Sisters to the family.
Raymond, then a model and fashion show producer, joined along with artist Lisa Reihana, heritage artist Ani O’Neill, dancer and costume maker Feeonaa Wall and events and film producer Jaunnie ‘Ilolahia. They even let some “blokes” in, including musician and performer Henry Ah-Foo and photographer Greg Semu.
The Sisters’ contribution was acknowledged last year with a major exhibition to mark the opening of Toi Art, new galleries at Te Papa in Wellington. Now the retrospective comes to Auckland and that’s special, says Raymond, because it’s here where the whole thing started.
“Back then, we really were largely ignored by the mainstream art world — it’s as simple as that — because we were considered too crafty or too woman-y or culturally inauthentic. It was urban and, of course, you can’t be urban and indigenous. Don’t be silly.”
The months between exhibitions have given the Sisters time to reflect, while Oceanic art — traditional and contemporary — has moved further on to the world stage thanks to the Oceania exhibition at the Royal Academy of Arts in London (it will soon be seen in France).
That’s good, says Raymond, but she believes there’s still more to be done for a richer picture of the Pacific — past, present and future — to emerge. It’s still tempting for Pacific arts and culture to be tagged as a “museum heritage piece” or, because it’s contemporary, inauthentic. “The power base is still very much in control of the institutions and the very Westerncentric notion of historical narratives . . . It’s really important for us to be supported in this global context and a lot of time, it’s artists themselves filtering through, making their own opportunities.”
She says being part of the collective helped each of them grow as artists, reconnecting them to cultures they sometimes felt alienated from, sharing techniques and providing support to take a few risks.
“We didn’t have a lot of access to the fibres from the Islands because they weren’t allowed into the country, so you had Pacific Islanders working with flax and all the mammas taught us to use the plastic raffia and then our Ma¯ ori sisters would say, ‘That’s cool — can I play with that?”’
But the way they worked, she says, was straight from their Pasifika backgrounds — materials were shared and redistributed, they were natural recyclers and conscious of what they were putting out into the world.
“We’ve always been like that and we really do make treasures, things that you do hand down to the next generation. We’re definitely not fast fashion . . . Definitely not.”
Raymond credits Nina Tonga, curator of Pacific Art at Te Papa, for “getting the band back together”.
“We were flabbergasted when Nina proposed to us this plan and we asked her, ‘are you mad?’ but she said it was a really important story; it’s interesting when you reflect on that story because we were just in it and doing it but — and this is the luxury of time — we did stand back, reflect and go, ‘Well, that really was amazing.’
“We were so blown away that anyone could remember us, especially the next generation down, but Nina reminded us that she was in the generation watching our antics and they didn’t forget us. We’re the classic outsiders done good.”
Tupaea laughs when asked if she ever imagined the Sisters would be showing in places like Te Papa or Auckland Art Gallery: “We were very young and lived for the moment but we had dreams and ambition and drive but, at that age, you can’t really see where you’ll be in five years’ time let alone 30.”
By its very creation, the work was political and the Sisters didn’t shy away from asking questions about gender, politics or the place of an urban indigenous generation in New Zealand. Tupaea is pleased they contributed to opening doors for the next generation and that the Sisters are still working, and still have much to contribute.