ART ON VIEW
looked back and researched as much as could
be learned about the art form from existing records
80
and community knowledge. Today moko
chisel work from the nineteenth century is practiced
only by a handful of experts, with many
preferring the use of the generic tattoo machine.
Through the activism of a small group of tohunga,
ta moko has resurfaced once again as
a culturally respected practice and can be seen
worn proudly by Maori men and women across
Aotearoa.
Māori Markings: Tā Moko
March 23–August 25, 2019
National Gallery of Australia, Canberra
www.nga.gov.au
Please see the website for tā moko workshops and events.
This exhibition has been made possible with the kind
assistance of the New Zealand High Commission in
Canberra and Toi Maori Aotearoa.
FIG. 7 (below left): Father & Son
unidentifi ed ancestors.
Photo by J. B. Brown.
Aotearoa. Ca. 1910.
Albumen print on board. 16.x 24 cm.
Michael Graham-Stewart Collection, Auckland.
This is a whānau, family, commissioned
image from the early twentieth century
of a proud son with his father. Both men
have huia feathers tucked into their
bowler hats and each is draped in a kiwi
feather cloak, kahu kiwi. The son is
holding a taiaha weapon, likely belonging
to his elderly father. The father’s moko
looks to be chisel work with the top lip
obscured by his moustache. He is likely
to have received his moko during the
1860s revival of tā moko brought about
by the King movement, kĦngitanga, when
King Tāwhiao’s fi ne moko paruhi was an
inspiration to many.
FIG. 8 (above): Māori rangatira (Te
Iriaha?). Photo by George Wesley Bishop
(1840–1887).
Auckland, Aotearoa. C. 1860s.
Carte des visite. 8.9 x 5.4 cm.
Michael Graham-Stewart Collection, Auckland.
Such was the popular proliferation of
both commissioned portraits and paid
sitters by New Zealand photographers
that many images exist today of
Māori ancestors who remain, as yet,
unidentifi ed. This rangatira ancestor
stares determinedly at the viewer, and his
moko is partial but deeply chiseled.
A copy of this carte des visite held in
the collections of the Museum of New
Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa16 has an
inscription on the reverse identifying
the man as “Te Iriaha” and continues
“Waikato chief—rebel. Lands confi scated.
Sees the justice of it and has sworn
allegiance,”17 which suggests this
rangatira was involved in the kĦngitanga,
Māori King movement, led by Te
Wherowhero Tāwhiao.
George Nuku states,
Both of these images are intensely special to
me in many ways. Serena captured defi ning
moments.
The fi rst is of the moment when all of the
drawing-up process was fi nally mapped out
on my throat and the lower half of my face.
My uncle, Tamihana Nuku—my mother’s
older brother and leader of our whānau—
had just fi nished the rituals of karakia. Haki
Williams (my kinsman), the person applying
the moko, had just fi nished his karakia to
commence the work also. We were at the
threshold: the point of no return. It was in
this moment my son Naboua came on his
own volition to press his face as close as
could be allowed to mine. He was eye level
to me. He did not speak one word.
I felt his silent presence very loudly. He
was transmitting to me (he has a tendency
to not speak without good reason) “Papa,
it’s going to be okay. It’s me, Naboua. I am
here.”
My head is tilted back, and my throat is
exposed so the skin is stretched in order for
Haki to moko there fi rst. I remember being
completely ready in my psyche and, for me,
this readiness somehow emits itself in the
form of a light from my eyes.
The second image is the fi rst morning of
my face in the light of a new day and life.
Haki stands on my right and
Tamihana stands on my left; it was a
strong moment—the whakapapa—the
genealogical strands that weave the three
of us together are somehow evident in this
image. We are all quite different, yet the
binding connection reinforces our sameness
within that difference.
Both Haki and Tamihana are wearing
taonga (treasures in the form of carvings
worn) that I specifi cally made for
them. Tamihana wears a whalebone
representational element of an ancestral
house carving belonging to our tribe, and
Haki wears a rei-puta form carved from a
solid piece of pearl shell that was part of
my payment tribute to him in return for
my moko. To me, this image conveys both
humility and pride. It conveys also a sense
of satisfaction and accomplishment on the
part of all three of us; it was indeed a fi rst
for us all in many ways.
It was for Haki a fi rst moko kanohi (face
tattoo). It was a fi rst for me, obviously. It
was a fi rst for Tamihana to witness and
to be an integral part of this moment and
process. It was a fi rst moment also for my
family in their lifetime(s), and they will keep
that in all the years to come.18
that decade. However, female moko kauae continued
into the twentieth century. The practice
was greatly reduced with the Tohunga Suppression
Act of 1907, an act aimed at dismantling
Maori use of traditional medicines and, more
specifi cally, curtailing the political activism of
the prophet Rua Kenana Hepetipa. Throughout
the nineteenth century, with its societal changes,
the introduction of Christianity, the land wars,
and other clashes with colonial settlers, Maori
culture remained exceptionally strong. This vibrancy
continued into the twentieth century
and remains so in the twenty-fi rst. The art of
moko and the wearing of moko never truly disappeared,
and in the 1970s Maori women began
to revive and reaffi rm the wearing of moko
kauae as a mark of cultural pride. By the 1990s
there was an active resurgence brought about
by a new era of tohunga-ta-moko experts who
/www.nga.gov.au