Artwork Information

Ka haere whakaterunga, ka haere whakatewaho, te tiki me te manaia e uruuru ana i ngā apa taiao o te peita. Puta mai ai tēnei peita i te wā i whakawhiti ai te tikanga o ngā peita tangata tipu i whakawhanakehia ai i raro i a Te Kooti Arikirangi Te Tūruki, ko ia te kaihanga o te pono Ringatū he pono e kōmitimiti ai i ngā pono Māori me ngā pono Karaitiana hei ātete i te koroniaratanga. Ko te poutū o tēnei peia he tumu, te manawa ora e hono ana i te whakapapa me te whenua. Kua mahora te peita ki te kōkōwai hei tohu mō te tangata whenua o te taiao; kawea ai te kaupapa o te ahi kā: ngā ahi e whakaatu ai i te hononga ki te whenua.

Tiki (human figure) and manaia (intermediary being) course upwards and outwards, feeding into the pockets of landscape layering the painting. This painting comes from a period in Shane Cotton’s practice in which he reinterpreted the figurative plant paintings developed under Te Kooti Arikirangi Te Tūruki, the founder of the Ringatū faith, that expressed the blending of Māori and Christian beliefs as a form of counter-colonial resistance. Here the painting’s vertical can be read as a stem, the manawa ora (breath of life) connecting whakapapa (genealogy) and land. Suffused in a rich kōkōwai (red ochre) symbolising the tangata whenua (people of the land) within the landscape, the painting conveys ahi kā: the burning fires of continuous connection to the land.