I didn't set out to write this book but was approached by a writer who acknowledged that a book on the topic deserved more than an entry level approach. Although the original brief was to create a tourist style entry level reference to the topic, I agreed to the project on the proviso that I would build upon prior authorship on the topic to present a current Māori viewpoint on the vast language that constitutes Māori visual arts.
This is not a coffee table book but rather an examination of the breadth of the topic, suited to students and scholars of Māori art and design. For me the value in writing, essentially a labour of love, and a sleepless period of four months, is to ensure Māori authorship that questions the validity of some of the prior assumptions around Māori Art, exists.
Māori Art and Design: Weaving, painting, carving and architecture by Julie Paama-Pengelly (New Holland Publishers) was awarded in the the second annual Ngā Kupu Ora Māori Book Awards, Massey University 2010 for the Art, Architecture and Design category.
For early Maori, art was inseparable from daily life, whether it was the pattern on a sculpted spade handle or the magnificently carved prow of a war canoe. Julie Paama-Pengelly traces the evolution of art and design in historic Maori culture and brings that art to life, focusing on four major disciplines: Weaving and fibre arts: includes tukutuku, kite making, basketry, netting and clothing; Painting and pigmentation: includes rock drawing and painting wooden objects; Sculpture and carving: includes stone, bone, wood carving and patterning; Architecture and structural arts: includes villages, storage and meeting houses, burial structures and bone containers. Chapters review the various art forms within each discipline and identify the source elements. Illustrated tables outline development periods, design conventions, and common figurative elements and motifs that distinguish Maori art and design. This book will be of great interest to readers who are new to the subject as well as to students and experts.
This is a profusely illustrated book which covers the wide span of Maori arts and crafts. It is salutary for an archaeologist to consider this span and think on how rarely we can see even a small fraction of what is shown here in our excavated material. This book is a fine introduction to the field, there has been nothing as comprehensive since Hamilton's Maori Art (1896). Commendably the author has attempted bringing in the perspective from archaeology but it is not always up to date. Some wider peer reviewing could surely have avoided this. There is a much fuller book seeking to escape from this one. In a few places the text seems abbreviated to the point of incomprehensibility, and some obvious opportunities to discuss contact period changes seem to be foregone. Let us hope perhaps that the larger book is still in prospect.
Julie's authorship projects include;
'La peau des femmes Marquer les corps, décoloniser les esprits dans le Pacifique’ by Sébastien Galliot, Julie Paama-Pengelly, Julia Mage’au Gray
Dans Techniques & Culture 2022/1 (n° 77), pages 130 à 157
Contributor and Biography ‘Tā moko’ in Crafting Aotearoa: A Cultural History of Making in New Zealand and the Wider Moana Oceania, Te Papa Press, 2019
'Māori Art and Design’ New Holland Press, Auckland, May 2010, reprinted 2013
Paper presented: ‘New Art Paradigms’ WIPCE, Melbourne, Australia, Nov 2008
Paper presented: ‘Artist as Provocateur’ Toi Awhio Conference, Palmerston North, 2008
'A History on Skin – The Art of Ta Moko’ Toi Maori Aotearoa, March, 2002
Arts columnist: ‘Tu Mai Magazine’, Hamilton, 1999-2002
I enjoy the process of collaboration with artists to transform the experience of Māori artists and the value attributed to Māori community of doing this work. share Māori stories and culture with a wider audience. This is important because it helps to promote understanding and respect for Māori culture.
Julie’s curatorial projects:
‘Roundabout: 108 Artists’, Wellington, Israel, 2007-2010
‘Navigating the Now’ Whakatane Museum & Gallery, 26 June-Aug 8 2010
‘Tau-Marumaru’ Harris Fine Arts Center BYU, Utah USA 2005
‘Tā Moko is NOT Tattoo’ interactive CD Rom Artpix 3 Houston, USA, 2001
‘Ngā Korero Aoteatea – Fifty Maori Artists’, Dowse Art Museum, Wellington 1999
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