Nina Oberg Humphries

Last updated

Nina Oberg Humphries
Born1990 (age 33–34)
Christchurch, New Zealand
Nationality New Zealand, Cook Islands
Alma mater Ilam School of Fine Arts, University of Canterbury
Known forPacific Arts advocacy, multimedia art
StyleContemporary interpretation of Cook Islands artefacts

Nina Oberg Humphries (born 1990) is a New Zealand multimedia artist and Pacific arts advocate and multimedia artist of Cook Islands descent. [1] [2] [3] Born in Christchurch in 1990, Oberg Humphries graduated from Ilam School of Fine Arts at the University of Canterbury in 2015. [4]

Contents

Oberg Humphries co-founded Fibre Gallery in Christchurch, a space for Pacific artists and the first gallery of its kind in the South Island, [5] a place where Pacific peoples can learn about their heritage and their cultures. [6] Fibre Gallery was established by Oberg Humphires because there were no platforms for Pacific artists to have opportunities, and there are not many Pacific art being displayed in Christchurch. [7] She is also a deputy chair for SCAPE Public Art board, an organisation that installs public art across Christchurch, as a voice for the Pacific community. [8]

Oberg Humphries is a director and co-founder of Tagata Moana Trust, a not-for-profit organisation committed to advocating for and empowering Pacific peoples through community resources, events and policies to highlight and strengthen the visibility and identity of Pacific people in New Zealand. [9] [2] [10]

Oberg Humphries' artistic practice works with predominately Cook Islands spiritual items — taura atua, items of pre-colonial times — and interrogates how the knowledge, and spirituality with multiple indigenous gods is largely disappearing in the Cook Islands, and what taura atua means to her. [11] Oberg Humphries' work reflects her dual cultural heritage of Pākehā (New Zealand European) and the Cook Islands, and what it means to be a second-generation Cook Islander in New Zealand. [4] Oberg Humphries invites members of the Pacific diaspora in New Zealand to engage with the artefacts of taura atua and recall their own stories of living and growing up in New Zealand. [12]

In 2023, Oberg Humphries was awarded Kiwi Bank New Zealander of the Year Awards, Local Hero for her services to Pacific Arts in South Island, New Zealand. [13]

Residencies

Selected solo exhibitions

Selected group exhibitions

Related Research Articles

Michael "Michel" Cliff Tuffery is a New Zealand artist of Samoan, Tahitian and Cook Islands descent. He is one of New Zealand's most well known artists and his work is held in many art collections in New Zealand and around the world.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">New Zealand art</span> Arts originating from New Zealand

New Zealand art consists of the visual and plastic arts originating from New Zealand and comes from different traditions: indigenous Māori art and that brought here including from early European mostly British settlers.

Wood carving is a common art form in the Cook Islands. Sculpture in stone is much rarer although there are some excellent carvings in basalt by Mike Tavioni. The proximity of islands in the southern group helped produce a homogeneous style of carving but which had special developments in each island. Rarotonga is known for its fisherman's gods and staff-gods, Atiu for its wooden seats, Mitiaro, Mauke and Atiu for mace and slab gods and Mangaia for its ceremonial adzes. Most of the original wood carvings were either spirited away by early European collectors or were burned in large numbers by missionary zealots.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ani O'Neill</span> New Zealand artist

Ani O'Neill is a New Zealand artist of Cook Island and Irish descent. She has been described by art historian Karen Stevenson as one of the core members of a group of artists of Pasifika descent who brought contemporary Pacific art to "national prominence and international acceptance".

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Maureen Lander</span> New Zealand weaver, multimedia installation artist and academic

Maureen Robin Lander is a New Zealand weaver, multimedia installation artist and academic. Lander is of Ngāpuhi and Pākehā descent and is a well-respected and significant artist who since 1986 has exhibited, photographed, written and taught Māori art. She continues to produce and exhibit work as well as attend residencies and symposia both nationally and internationally.

Sopolemalama Filipe Tohi is a Tongan artist who has lived in New Zealand since 1978. He has exhibited in major exhibitions in New Zealand and abroad. Several major collections include his work. The 2010 Art and Asia Pacific Almanac describes him as "Tongan art's foremost ambassador".

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Rosanna Raymond</span> New Zealand artist

Rosanna Marie Raymond is a New Zealand artist, poet, and cultural commentator and Raymond was recognised for "Pasifika artists practicing contemporary and heritage art forms in Aotearoa," winning the Senior Pacific Artist Award Winner of 2018, at the Arts Pasifika Awards through Creative New Zealand.

<i>Marumaru Atua</i>

Marumaru Atua is a reconstruction of a vaka moana, a double-hulled Polynesian voyaging canoe. It was built in 2009 by the Okeanos Foundation for the Sea. In 2014, it was gifted to the Cook Islands Voyaging Society. It is used to teach polynesian navigation.

Mahiriki Tangaroa is a New Zealand-born Cook Islands photographer and painter. She is a former director of the Cook Islands National Museum. She is recognised as a leading contemporary Cook Islands artist, and her work is regularly exhibited in galleries in New Zealand and the Cook Islands.

Te Au o Tonga is a reconstruction of a vaka moana, a double-hulled Polynesian voyaging canoe. It was built in 1994 by former Cook Islands Prime Minister Thomas Davis and the Cook Islands Voyaging Society. It was used to teach polynesian navigation.

Kulimoe'anga Stone Maka, is an interdisciplinary artist of Tongan heritage who lives in Christchurch, New Zealand. In 2011, he was awarded the Emerging Pasifika Artist Award from Creative New Zealand. Maka's work has been exhibited in museums and art galleries in New Zealand, Hawai'i Australia and Tonga. In 2020 he was selected to represent New Zealand at the 22nd Biennale in Sydney.

Andy Leleisi’uao is a New Zealand artist of Samoan heritage known for his modern and post-modern Pacific paintings and art. He was paramount winner at the 26th annual Wallace Art Awards in 2017 and awarded a Senior Pacific Artist Award at the Arts Pasifika Awards in 2021.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Tanu Gago</span>

Tanu Gago is a Samoan interdisciplinary artist, filmmaker, and curator based in Auckland, New Zealand. He is also co-founder of arts collective FAFSWAG. He is best known for his work that explores intersections of Pacific queer and gender identities, as well as themes of cultural heritage and colonization. Gago's work has been shown in various exhibitions and festivals both nationally and internationally, including the Auckland Arts Festival, the Museum of Contemporary Art in Sydney, and the Venice Biennale. Throughout his career, Gago has received numerous awards and grants, including the Creative New Zealand Arts Pasifika Award in 2017 and the Arts Foundation Laureate Award in 2020. He received a New Zealand Queens Birthday honour in 2019 for services to art and the LGBTIQ+ community.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Benjamin Work</span> New Zealand artist of Tongan descent.

Benjamin Work is an artist from New Zealand with Tongan and Scottish heritage. He is well known for his murals across New Zealand, as well as his paintings inspired by his genealogy back to Tonga.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bergman Gallery</span> New Zealand and Cook Islands art gallery

Bergman Gallery is an international commercial art gallery with an original gallery in Rarotonga, Cook Islands, and a second gallery in Auckland, New Zealand. The gallery was first established in 2016 by Ben Bergman in Rarotonga, Cook Islands. Bergman Gallery represents and has represented many significant international artists from New Zealand, Cook Islands and Australia, including Fatu Feu'u, Luise Fong, Andy Leleisi'uao, Reuben Paterson, Michel Tuffery, Billy Apple, Mahiriki Tangaroa, Sylvia Marsters, Benjamin Work, Lucas Grogan, Luke Thurgate and Telly Tuita.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Sylvia Marsters</span> New Zealand artist

Sylvia Lolita Cathrine Marsters is a New Zealand artist of Cook Islands descent. In 2003, she received a residency in the Cook Islands from Creative New Zealand, and she has exhibited in Rarotonga many times since, as well as in New Zealand, Fiji and New York. Her exhibitions draw big crowds in the Cook Islands.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Raymond Sagapolutele</span> New Zealand photographer

Raymond Eddie Sagapolutele is a New Zealand photographer and visual artist of Samoan descent, active as a photographer since 2003.

Tungane Broadbent is a Cook Islands artist, notable for her tivaevae/tivaivai, with her career making tivaivai spanning five decades. Broadbent founded the O’oa Fabric & Fibre Arts group in 2007, Rarotonga, to teach women to sew tivaivai.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Staff god</span> Sacred objects of the Cook Islands Māori

Staff gods are sacred objects within the cultural and spiritual practices of the Cook Islands Māori, particularly prominent on the island of Rarotonga. These objects were crafted from wood and adorned with intricate carvings and symbolic designs, combining images of gods with their human descendants. The staffs range in length between 28 inches (71 cm) and 18 feet and were carried and displayed horizontally.

Ioana Gordon-Smith is an arts curator and writer from New Zealand. She was assistant curator for Yuki Kihara Aotearoa New Zealand at the 59th Venice Biennale and co-curator of Naadohbil: To Draw Water, an internationally touring Indigenous exhibition. She co-founded the publication Marinade: Aotearoa Journal of Moana Art to feature New Zealand artists with Pacific Island heritage.

References

  1. 1 2 "UC 2020 artist-in-residence to examine museum's Pacific taonga". The University of Canterbury. 4 June 2020. Retrieved 29 September 2023.
  2. 1 2 Humphries, Nina Oberg (21 September 2023). "For Nina Oberg Humphries, art is everything". The Spinoff. Retrieved 29 September 2023.
  3. ↑ "Cook Islands Va'ine at Aotearoa Art Fair". Cook Islands News. 12 November 2022. Retrieved 11 October 2023.
  4. 1 2 3 "CoCA Centre of Contemporary Art Toi Moroki". coca.org.nz. Retrieved 29 September 2023.
  5. ↑ Flightdec (31 July 2022). "Fibre Gallery - a distinctively Moana gallery showcasing Pacific artists". ArtBeat. Retrieved 29 September 2023.
  6. ↑ "Pasifika art gallery gains popularity in Christchurch". RNZ. 7 June 2023. Retrieved 3 October 2023.
  7. ↑ Gates, Charlie (2 October 2022). "New gallery showcases Pasifika artists and new take on The Last Supper". Stuff. Retrieved 3 October 2023.
  8. ↑ "The board - SCAPE public art". 30 July 2021. Retrieved 29 September 2023.
  9. ↑ "Something old, something new…". Cook Islands News. 3 June 2023. Retrieved 3 October 2023.
  10. ↑ Feeney, Warren (29 July 2022). "10 exhibitions to look out for in Canterbury in August". Stuff. Retrieved 11 October 2023.
  11. ↑ Brooks, Sam (25 September 2023). "The Christchurch artist drawing on her Cook Islands identity". Stuff . Retrieved 29 September 2023.
  12. ↑ "Avaiki". christchurchartgallery.org.nz. Retrieved 29 September 2023.
  13. ↑ "Kiwibank Local Hero Medallists 2024". New Zealander of The Year. Retrieved 19 December 2023.
  14. ↑ "Leadership New Zealand and Creative New Zealand develop Māori and Pasifika arts leadership". creativenz.govt.nz. Retrieved 29 September 2023.
  15. 1 2 3 "Nina Oberg Humphries". Mutual Art. Retrieved 30 September 2020.
  16. ↑ "Ta'ai Room Sheet" (PDF). The Physics Room. 16 October 2020.
  17. ↑ Vano, Kendall (13 July 2022). "Bergman Gallery Exhibition: Te Atuitanga - Between our Cloak of Stars". TP+. Retrieved 30 September 2023.
  18. 1 2 van Wetering, Victor (8 August 2016). "INFLUX of political agency" (PDF). Tautai.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.