James Ormsby

Name
James Ormsby
Iwi/Ethnicity
Ngāti Maniapoto/Māori
Tainui/Waikato/Māori
Te Arawa/Māori
Scotland
Date of birth
1957
Place of birth
Hamilton/Waikato (region)/New Zealand
Gender
Male
Biography
Employing a distinctive vocabulary of personal symbols, motifs and materials, James Ormsby’s large-scale, finely detailed drawings map unique indigenous cartographies that express his whakapapa.

It is Ormsby’s distinctive graphite drawings for which he is perhaps best known. Inspired by ancestral Māori and Scottish mark-making and symbols, they explore the significance of symbols in communicating and connecting histories and genealogies.

Ormsby has been a finalist in the National Contemporary Art Awards, the Wallace Art Awards and the New Zealand Painting and Printmaking Awards.