Toi whakairo (art carving) or just whakairo (carving) is a Māori traditional art of carving in wood, stone or bone. [1]
Toi whakairo (art carving) or just whakairo (carving) is a Māori traditional art of carving in wood, stone or bone. [1]
Timber was formed into houses, fencepoles, pouwhenua, containers, taiaha, tool handles and waka (boats). Carving tools were made from stone, preferably the very hard pounamu (greenstone). Bone was used for fish hooks and needles amongst other things. Designs on carvings depict tribal ancestors, and are often important for establishing iwi and hapu identity. [2]
After European contact, many traditionally carved items were no longer widely produced in favour of using Western counterparts, such as waka huia treasure containers being replaced with lockable seaman's chests by the 1840s. [3] Traditionally, many expert carvers focused on creating elaborate waka taua (war canoes), however this declined during the 1860s when waka taua were superseded by whaleboats or small European style sailing ships. [2] During the decline, carvers focused instead on carved marae, objects such as tokotoko, or carved aspects of buildings such as churches. [4] [2] Most traditions that survived this period into the late 1800s were centred around communal whakairo schools, mostly located around Rotorua, Te Urewera, the Whanganui River and the East Coast. [2] Carving schools balanced producing art for their own people with commercial works, with many of the most successful being Te Arawa (Ngāti Whakaue, Ngāti Pikiao and Ngāti Tarāwhai), located near Rotorua, during the tourism boom to the area in the 1870s, with an increased need for carved works such as the model village at Whakarewarewa, and souvenirs. [2]
The Māori Arts and Crafts Institute at Whakarewarewa in Rotorua, opened by Sir Āpirana Ngata in 1926, is a stronghold of traditional carving skills. [2] [5] Ngata put arts as a 'vital part' of the rejuvenation of Māori culture. [6] Hone Taiapa was head of this school for some time. Since the Māori Renaissance in the 1960s there has been a resurgence of whakairo, alongside other traditional Māori practices, and an expansion into contemporary art. Many carvers express their practices in explicitly spiritual terms. [7] The Māori Art Market (funded by the state-sponsored Toi Māori Aotearoa) is a significant venue for the promotion and sale of whakairo.
Wooden Māori carvings are often painted to pick out features. Before modern paints were available this was often a mixture of kōkōwai (red ochre) and shark-liver oil. This was thought to preserve the carvings and also imbue them with a tapu (sacred) status. [8] Following the introduction of metal tools there was a substantial increase in decorative ornamentation, particularly in wood and bone carving.
Te Papa and Auckland Art Gallery have substantial holdings of whakairo, with Te Papa in particular having many digitised in their Collections online website. [14]
Māori culture is the customs, cultural practices, and beliefs of the indigenous Māori people of New Zealand. It originated from, and is still part of, Eastern Polynesian culture. Māori culture forms a distinctive part of New Zealand culture and, due to a large diaspora and the incorporation of Māori motifs into popular culture, it is found throughout the world. Within Māoridom, and to a lesser extent throughout New Zealand as a whole, the word Māoritanga is often used as an approximate synonym for Māori culture, the Māori-language suffix -tanga being roughly equivalent to the qualitative noun-ending -ness in English. Māoritanga has also been translated as "[a] Māori way of life."
Inia Morehu Tauhia Watene Iarahi Waihurihia Te Wiata was a New Zealand Māori bass-baritone opera singer, film actor, whakairo (carver) and artist.
The New Zealand Māori Arts and Crafts Institute (NZMACI) is an indigenous traditional art school located in Rotorua New Zealand. It operates the national schools of three major Māori art forms.
Hōne Te Kāuru Taiapa, also known as John Taiapa, was a Māori wood carver and carpenter of Ngati Porou. He was the younger brother of master Māori carver Pine Taiapa. The two brothers worked closely with politician Sir Apirana Ngata on reintroducing Māori sculpture to the country after World War II. Both men, for example, demonstrated Māori carving skills by carving traditional homes on the North Island in marae as part of a programme by the New Zealand Department of Education to educate teachers to reintroduce Māori arts to school children. New Zealand poet Hone Tuwhare included a poem about the wood carver, "On a theme by Hone Taiapa," in his 1973 collection Something Nothing.
Rangikaiamokura Wirihana Hetet is a Maori master carver of Ngāti Tuwharetoa and Ngāti Maniapoto descent.
Diggeress Rangituatahi Te Kanawa was a New Zealand Māori tohunga raranga of Ngati Maniapoto and Ngati Kinohaku descent. At the time of her death she was regarded as New Zealand's most renowned weaver.
Wiremu "Piri" Te Ranga Poutapu was a New Zealand Māori master carver and carpenter. He identified with the Ngāti Korokī and Waikato iwi. He was born in Maungatautari, Waikato, New Zealand in 1905. He was known as Piri, the Māori transliteration of Bill, short for William, of which his first name Wiremu is the Māori transliteration.
Tene Waitere (1853–1931) was a notable New Zealand Māori carver. He identified with the Ngāti Tarāwhai and Te Arawa iwi. His mother was Ani Pape, the daughter of Te Rāhui, a Ngāti Tarāwhai leader. As a young girl, she was captured by Ngāpuhi during an attack on Rotorua in 1823 and taken as a slave to Northland, where she was forced to marry a Waitere. Tene Waitere was born probably in 1853 or 1854 at Mangamuka. When Tene was a few years old an uncle brought him, his elder sister Mereana Waitere and their mother to Ruatō, on Lake Rotoiti. There he was trained as a carver by Wero Tāroi. He married Ruihi Te Ngahue of Tūhourangi and they had one child, a daughter Tuhipō. One of Tuhipō's children was Rangitiaria Dennan, better known as Guide Rangi. Eramiha Neke Kapua, another carver, was Waitere's nephew, son of his sister Mereana. Some of Waitere's carvings included Tiki-a-Tamamutu, Hinemihi, the Kearoa whakawae and Rauru, and in the 1900s worked on the Whakarewarewa model village near Rotorua.
Pineamine "Pine" Taiapa (1901–1972) was a notable New Zealand wood carver, farmer, rehabilitation officer, writer and genealogist. He was one of the first students of the School of Māori Arts in Rotorua under Āpirana Ngata. As a carver he was part of over ninety-nine wharenui around Aotearoa New Zealand.
Tukutuku panelling is a distinctive art form of the Māori people of New Zealand, a traditional latticework used to decorate meeting houses (wharenui). Other names are tuitui and arapaki. Tukutuku flank the posts around the edge of the wharenui, the posts are usually carved and represent ancestors. The patterns of tukutuku have symbolic meanings.
Lyonel Grant is a New Zealand Māori master carver and sculptor. Born in Rotorua, he affiliates to Ngāti Pikiao and Te Arawa.
Chris Bailey is a Māori sculptor and carver. Bailey studied Māori language and Māori material culture at the University of Auckland under Dante Bonica. He lives and works on Waiheke Island.
Rangi Kipa is a New Zealand sculptor, carver, illustrator and tā moko artist.
Pakaariki "Paki" Harrison was a New Zealand master carver from Ngāti Porou. He is regarded as one of New Zealand's greatest carvers.
Christina Hurihia Wirihana is a New Zealand weaver from Te Arawa, Ngāti Maniapoto, Ngāti Pikiao, Ngāti Rangiunora, Ngāti Raukawa, Tainui iwi.
Ngāti Tarāwhai is a Māori iwi of the Rotorua area of New Zealand, and a member of the Te Arawa confederation of tribes. The iwi's rohe covers the western shore of Lake Ōkataina.
Matekino Lawless is a New Zealand master weaver from Ngāti Maniapoto and Ngāti Whawhakia iwi. Her work is held at marae, in private collections, in the collections of New Zealand and international museums, and at the Headquarters of the United Nations.
Clive E. Fugill is a New Zealand Māori tohunga whakairo, author and long serving kaiako whakairo of the New Zealand Māori Arts and Crafts Institute. He affiliates to the Ngāti Ranginui iwi of Tauranga, and also has links to Ngāti Raukawa, Ngāti Rangiwewehi and Ngāti Tūkorehe.
John Bevan Ford was a New Zealand Māori artist and educator who started exhibiting in 1966. He is a leading figure in contemporary Māori art with art held in all large public collections of New Zealand. In 2005 Ford received the Creative New Zealand Te Waka Toi Kingi Ihaka Award.
Buck Loy Nin (1942–1996) was a New Zealand artist influential in the development of contemporary Māori art in Aotearoa New Zealand. His landscape paintings have been included in survey exhibitions of contemporary Māori art including Te Waka Toi: Contemporary Maori Art that toured the United States in 1992 and Toi Tū Toi Ora: Contemporary Māori Art curated by Nigel Borrell and opened in 2020. Selwyn Muru called him 'Buck Nin the Mythmaker'.
{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: others (link)1911–1979