This essay is written from the perspective of a Māori art museum
professional and steward of Gottfried Lindauer's Māori portraits.
My perspective, as both a Māori and a museum professional, is
grounded in the experience of two systems of know ledge - Māori
and European. It is from this position that I understand and will
explain what Lindauer's portraits represent, why Māori care about
them and what they mean to us in our contemporary lives. Cultural
interactions between Māori and the museums (as institutional
stewards of Māori portraits) create a fertile ground for
cross-cultural understanding. The historical Aotearoa (original
name for New Zealand) New Zealand context in which Lindauer worked
is important to consider when seeking to understand the
significance of this artist's Māori portraits, as is the historical
milieu from which his painting style originates.
Māori ancestors' social, political and cultural lives
intersected with the mass migration of European settlers to
Aotearoa New Zealand.3
Missionaries and traders began arriving in Aotearoa New Zealand in
the late 1700s. Immigration was steady from the 1820s onwards, two
decades before colonisation was made 'official' through the 1840
Treaty of Waitangi, and Aotearoa New Zealand became a destination
for people from many nations and regions, including England,
Scotland, Ireland, Germany, Belgium, Austria and Bohemia. During
the first fifty years of contact be tween Māori and European
immigrants and up to the time when Lindauer started painting his
Māori portraits in the mid-1870s, Māori were noted for successfully
responding to changes for which they knew no precedent. That Māori
survived and still exist is, however, no miracle, and Lindauer's
portraits depict Māori with their mana (authority) intact. Cultural
resilience was the force that enabled Māori to cope with the
transition from being people in a sovereign country to citizens of
a colony renamed New Zealand.
The protocols Māori people and the museum sector use when
managing the reproduction, dissemination and interpretation of
ancestral images is important in relation to Lindauer's Māori
portraits. In our world-view, Māori people are the cultural
stewards of things Māori.4
Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tāmaki is the formal guardian of
Lindauer's 62 painted portraits of Māori, gifted to Auckland City
in 1915 by Lindauer's patron Henry Partridge (1848-1931). The
Gallery took some time to appreciate its responsibilities as
custodian. After Lindauer's portraits had entered the collection,
they were displayed at Auckland City Art Gallery in the first half
of the twentieth century. They were, however, not then considered
with the esteem in which they are now held. The Gallery was
establishing its reputation as a centre of artistic excellence; it
focused on settler and colonial art and the new developments of art
in New Zealand. Introducing British modernism to New Zealand was
prioritised; international prints were collected and a
controversial exhibition of Henry Moore was opened in 1955. The
fact that Lindauer's portraits were viewed as having social and
historical importance but did not follow the contemporary styles of
art predominant in Britain and appreciated in New Zealand at this
time, led to their neglect. For reasons I will outline below, the
Gallery's position has meanwhile changed, and Lindauer's portraits
are recognised as taonga (treasures) that must be exhibited, cared
for and researched.
Although descendants do not 'own' Lindauer's painted portraits
in the care of galleries, museums and private collectors, the
paintings of ancestors in public and private collections are
considered part of a living Māori reality. Māori descendants,
scholars and stewards address them, weep over them and share joy
with them as if they were living beings. The figures in the
paintings are respected and beloved ancestors, and therefore Māori
create ceremonies for them, because in the Māori world-view the
mana of the portraits can be harmful to people from cultures
different from ours. Māori care about them and their impact on
people, because ancestral images are considered mediators between
the human and the supernatural world of Māori, which is inhabited
by good and bad spirit beings. We pay the portraits the same regard
we do cultural objects made by Māori people.5 It is the duty of stewards to
carry out appropriate rituals for the well-being and cultural
safety of people. The ceremonies, which occur during the sharing of
Lindauer's portraits, are moments of cultural intersection which
reveal to others the beauty of difference. Meeting points of
difference create tension, but also opportunities for discussing
perceptions, responses and discoveries between the museum and our
various groups of visitors, regarding not only the painted images
of ancestors as taonga but also the role of the art world in the
display of ancestral objects, their interpretation and
reproduction.
Over the past fifteen years Auckland Art Gallery has established
a process in which descendants of Lindauer's sitters are asked for
permission for their ancestor's images to be reproduced in books
across all academic disciplines, on websites, or to be displayed
for personal use in private homes. Such requests come from
descendants themselves, national and international scholars, art
galleries and museums, education institutions, publishers,
individuals and commercially interested people. Auckland Art
Gallery engages descendants in the permission process because the
Gallery sees the advantages of having a relationship with living
relatives. The co-operation is constantly under review, but with
trust and transparent stewardship practices it is possible for all
to benefit from the cultural respect for, and stewardship of, the
art objects. In the past, Lindauer's Māori portraits were sometimes
inappropriately used by tourist souvenir makers and by marketing or
promotion agencies. For example, the portraits were printed onto
tea towels, coffee cups and dinner plates. Today, permissions for
reproduction are obtained only by Auckland Art Gallery, and we also
determine the parameters for re production.6 Some requests are denied by the
Gallery and descendants; we do not allow, for instance, the digital
alteration of a portrait, the display of preserved heads or
replicas of such heads together with portraits, or the publication
of misleading texts accompanying reproductions of the
paintings.
The notion of seeking permission to display or reproduce images
is not new in the museum sector and is underpinned by copyright
law. Descendants of the people painted 140 years ago by Lindauer as
well as museums and galleries who engage in negotiations with them
are required to pay constant attention to the process. Such
consultation creates positive relations between Māori and the
museum culture in Aotearoa New Zealand today, as exchanges and
relations improve institutional knowledge and the understanding of
our ancestors. The visitors also benefit from the interpretation we
are able to provide based on information from descendants. In a
global context, this permission process can also be related to a
growing awareness of and compliance with the 2007 United Nations
Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous People, which grants
indigenous people the right to maintain and protect their cultural
heritage, including paintings, photographs, taonga objects or
architecture.7
The education of Europeans in a Māori perspective on portraiture
corresponds with the education of Māori in European aesthetic
conventions and paradigms. Being educated in different cultural
approaches is vital to fruitful museum and gallery collaborations.
The permission process recognises the Māori belief system which
regards images of ancestors - whether painted by Lindauer or carved
by a traditional Māori practitioner - as carriers of mana. The mana
of ancestors is crucial to Māori, and the wrongful use of images
denigrates the ancestors and detracts from their mana as well as
from the mana of the stewards or descendants. The painted portraits
of ancestors are imbued with generations of mana, and their images
are not only living, they are linked to Māori DNA, history and
cultural legacy. This is why Māori and the Gallery consider
Lindauer's paintings treasured heirlooms.
Asking permission is not a new idea for Māori - it is a cultural
practice handed down the generations. In the museum context,
however, with the intention to tour cultural objects and images
internationally it was pioneered by Hirini Moko Mead during the
preparation of the exhibition Te Maori: Maori Art from New
Zealand Collections (1984-1986).8 Descendant communities were
approached to allow objects to travel first to the United States of
America and then to four museums in Aotearoa New Zealand. The
exhibition was a hugely successful collaboration between Aotearoa
New Zealand, United States museum professionals and the Māori
descendants who accompanied the taonga on their journey around
America.
Asking permission for taonga Māori (Māori treasures) to travel
was unprecedented at the time of Te Maori. However,
American art museums accepted this as essential for the success of
the exhibition in the United States. Not all descendants gave their
consent; nevertheless those taonga that were authorised by
descendants to tour received appropriate blessings and ceremonies
at their farewell, their installation in the United States and
welcome on their return home. The task of interpreting the taonga
in the Te Maori exhibition was carried out by American and
Māori professionals as well as community descendants.
Today the political conditions for permissions have changed
compared to those relevant in the twentieth century and for the
Te Maori exhibition. Such changes challenge the notion of
consultation and good intention. The tour of Lindauer's portraits
to Europe has received enthusiastic support from the majority of
descendants. They, together with tribal groups and elders, have
offered encouragement; they recognise that people from the other
side of the world will see the painted images of their ancestors
and understand that Māori continue to thrive in the twenty-first
century. These descendants have affirmed the uniqueness of this
moment in the history of the paintings, especially because the
Māori practice of performing rituals and ceremonies will be
followed through. However, not all descendants have agreed to
support the tour. This is not because the portraits are leaving
Aotearoa New Zealand and touring to Europe; rather, it results from
political issues related to the post-Treaty settlement endeavours
in which Māori tribes are currently engaged. The political context
of Lindauer's portraits throws into relief not only the
contemporary situation Māori live in, but also methods we use to
navigate a way forward as a consequence of Treaty agreements, which
are linked to indigenous rights movements worldwide.
Thus, the display of paintings of Māori ancestors in Berlin's
prestigious Alte Nationalgalerie (Old National Gallery) is a
historic moment, because it is the first occasion the paintings
have left Aotearoa New Zealand en masse since their creation.
Moreover it reinforces the necessity to employ the same cultural
principles that were applied to those taonga which travelled to the
United States in the 1980s. In Aotearoa New Zealand's art museum
context Lindauer's portrait paintings are works of art made in a
European tradition, yet they are also considered Māori taonga or
beloved art treasures. This meeting point of two traditions is
thought to be provoking and beneficial for inter-cultural
development in the museum and gallery field.
In October 2013, native Hawaiians, artists and supporters of the
arts protested against the misuse of a photograph in the col
lection of the Hawaii State Foundation on Culture and the Arts
(HSFCA). Francis Haar's (1908-1997) 1968 photograph of an esteemed
elder and renowned hula practitioner, Iolani Luahine (1915-1978), a
major cultural figure in the Hawaiian islands, was improperly
appropriated from the HSFCA's collection without permission from
the Haar estate or Luahine's family. Luahine's head and hands were
digitally erased from the image and the torso reproduced on
promotional posters, tote bags, T-shirts and coffee mugs. This is
not a situation unique to Hawaii, but it is a reminder that even in
today's climate of established indigenous rights, the appropriate
permission protocols to reproduce art works, particularly of
indigenous subjects, are frequently ignored. When called to
account, HSFCA took responsibility for their actions, apologised
and made amends.
The Western practice of collecting items of material culture and
capturing the image of indigenous peoples is a matter of history.
The range and number of historical paintings and photo graphs of
indigenous peoples in public and private collections strongly
demonstrate how the image of native peoples was commercialised.
This was noted by Gordon Brown and Hamish Keith who, in An
Introduction to New Zealand Painting 1839-1980, quote art
historian Eric Hall McCormick's (1906-1995) description of the
colonial period and the painting of Māori subjects as being
"laborious archaeologising".9
An example of appropriate consultation was given by the Museum
fur Volkerkunde (Museum of Ethnology) in Hamburg, Germany. This
museum is a steward of the Māori carved meeting house Rauru.10 Together with the descendants
of the house builders and carvers (the knowledge keepers of the
tribe who are the cultural owners of the house), the museum as
co-steward worked collaboratively on all aspects of Rauru's
history, including its restoration in 2012. The museum has
demonstrated that it is committed to maintaining contact with the
cultural owners so that the lines of descent are not broken between
people and a beloved cultural house. The Museum of Ethnology
learned that negotiations take time - in Hamburg's case it took
twenty years to develop a productive relationship with
descendants.
Relationships are important to indigenous people; maintaining
them takes time and is a shared responsibility passed down the
generations. Māori have a clear idea of how to work together with
non-indigenous professionals, researchers, museums, galleries and
education institutions in order to keep alive the legacy of Māori
stewardship of taonga. And they wish the world to learn about Māori
culture.
In the context of Aotearoa New Zealand, the positioning of
cultural treasures is connected to a history that reaches back to
Article 2 of the 1840 Tiriti o Waitangi (Treaty of Waitangi), New
Zealand's founding document. Since 1840, guiding principles for
interpreting the Treaty have resulted in an improved understanding
that supports Māori tino rangatiratanga (sovereignty) and control
of taonga (treasures) including tangible and intangible assets.
This position triggered a flood of Māori rights and paralleled
movements for change and political, social and cultural visibility
on the world stage.
During the 1960s and 1970s, protest efforts gained world-wide
attention, including the anti-Vietnam-War protest movement and the
African American civil rights movement. Much closer to home, the
exclusion of Māori rugby union football players from rugby tours to
South Africa exposed the New Zealand Government to the
anti-apartheid movement. Revolutionary change was imminent, and
Māori activists led the charge demonstrating for recognition, land
and human rights, and in doing so brought about a transformation in
political consciousness and recognition of Māori as Treaty of
Waitangi partners in practice, not just in name. Between 1975 and
1978 three significant events occurred: the Māori land march to
Parliament (1975), the Bastion Point occupation (1977) and the
Raglan golf course occupation (1978) - all protests against the
Government who had taken these lands for public works. The
revitalisation of Māori language was followed closely by a
heightened visibility of Māori cultural identity, and the
re-energising of traditional roles in Māori communities and all
sectors of Aotearoa New Zealand's society.
These combined activities not only reclaimed mana for Māori
people, they also spurred growth and interest in New Zealand's
history, literature, music, performing arts, especially Māori art
and artists. As part of the Māori Renaissance in late 20th-century
Aotearoa New Zealand, the museum sector gained profile through
exhibition activities, the most successful being the previously
mentioned Te Maori: Maori Art from New Zealand
Collections. During its display in the Auckland City Art
Gallery, all of Lindauer's Māori portraits were shown in the
welcoming gallery to the exhibition. In this space, rituals of
encounter and ceremonies were performed and exchanges took place
between visiting iwi (tribes), hap-a (subtribes), whanau (families)
and descendants. Lindauer's portraits were affirmed as cultural
treasures for all the Aotearoa New Zealand's people.
Museums and galleries are important agents in the globalisation
of art and culture. However, while it is one thing to satisfy an
interest in and curiosity about the ways of life and material
cultures of others through collecting, exhibiting and interpreting
items of their material culture, it is another thing to
re-contextualise such objects for new audiences and to make them
relevant in a constantly changing world. Perhaps the way to a
deeper understanding of cultural meaning through art and objects is
to recall their original functions. The museum field needs a new
conception of indigenous cultures and their material lives, and
this is best achieved by developing relationships with indigenous
people and working with their knowledge passed down the
generations.
As I have indicated, many of the cultures we encounter through
art and objects in galleries and museums are not dead.11 They are alive, still
expressing their concerns and working creatively. In museums,
cultural objects are removed from their cultural contexts, and
through this separation and new placement they may cease to be
activated by that culture. A way forward is to understand that
collected cultures in museums represent moments in time. Yet they
exist in a continuum because they are linked to - and belong to -
living peoples still located and active in their places of
origin.
Such knowledge and understanding are supported by contemporary
copyright laws, i.e. by assertions of legal and cultural ownership.
An example is The Native American Graves Protection and
Repatriation Act 1990 (NAGPRA), a United States federal law. The
Act requires federal agencies and institutions that receive federal
funding to return Native American 'cultural items' to lineal
descendants, to culturally affiliated Indian tribes and Native
Hawaiian organisations. Such cultural items include human remains,
funerary and sacred objects and objects of cultural patrimony.12
The traditional practitioners and descendant communities who
take care of the knowledge linked to items such as those covered by
NAGPRA hold the key to re-activating them. They are important in
directing museums' engagement and interpreting the treasures. If we
follow Article 11 of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights
of Indigenous People, culture - inside and outside the museum
sector - is seen as an expanded idea that encompasses all peoples.
The experience of Auckland Art Gallery impressively proves the
fruitfulness of close co-operation with descendants. Gottfried
Lindauer's paintings are out of European copyright, therefore the
Gallery is by law entitled to reproduce, interpret and exhibit them
under the terms it decides. However, the Gallery chooses to
respectfully work with descendants, and not only as far as
permissions are concerned: the Gallery also practises inclusivity
regarding the artworks' interpretation. An example is the 2013
Māori Television series Behind the Brush,13 made in collaboration with
Awa Films and presented in the Berlin exhibition with German
subtitles.
Audiences in Aotearoa New Zealand, and people from descendant
cultures in particular, confirm that the experience of art is
relevant to their world-view, and they look for connectivity to the
subject matter and to historical relevance of the paintings rather
than to the artistic refinements. There is a demand from visitors
for improved and authentic interpretation, and the expertise does
not necessarily reside in the museum. Descendants have come to
expect appropriate consultation and the opportunity to maintain,
protect and develop the past, present and future manifestations of
their cultures, which is also expressly recommended by the United
Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous People. It is worth
repeating that the world is now in a new era, and there is nothing
to prohibit creative collaboration that brings new meanings to
artworks.
Shared Legacies
Tikarohia nga whetu
1
Contemporary Māori live in different cultural
circumstances compared to our ancestors depicted in the
nineteenth-century by Bohemian artist Gottfried Lindauer
(1839-1926); and we are the proud modern descendants of that past.
To positively add to our cultural legacies Māori share the
historical and living evidence of our ancestors' productive lives.
We reflect on how our forebears responded to rapid changes during
the European colonising expansion and to the related attempts to
subjugate non-European peoples with European ideologies during the
nineteenth century.2 These responses inform a modern
narrative of colonisation, which is continually being constructed,
critiqued and re-constructed.
This essay is written from the perspective of
a Māori art museum professional and steward of Gottfried Lindauer's
Māori portraits. My perspective, as both a Māori and a museum
professional, is grounded in the experience of two systems of know
ledge - Māori and European. It is from this position that I
understand and will explain what Lindauer's portraits represent,
why Māori care about them and what they mean to us in our
contemporary lives. Cultural interactions between Māori and the
museums (as institutional stewards of Māori portraits) create a
fertile ground for cross-cultural understanding. The historical
Aotearoa (original name for New Zealand) New Zealand context in
which Lindauer worked is important to consider when seeking to
understand the significance of this artist's Māori portraits, as is
the historical milieu from which his painting style originates.
Māori ancestors' social, political and
cultural lives intersected with the mass migration of European
settlers to Aotearoa New Zealand.3 Missionaries and
traders began arriving in Aotearoa New Zealand in the late 1700s.
Immigration was steady from the 1820s onwards, two decades before
colonisation was made 'official' through the 1840 Treaty of
Waitangi, and Aotearoa New Zealand became a destination for people
from many nations and regions, including England, Scotland,
Ireland, Germany, Belgium, Austria and Bohemia. During the first
fifty years of contact be tween Māori and European immigrants and
up to the time when Lindauer started painting his Māori portraits
in the mid-1870s, Māori were noted for successfully responding to
changes for which they knew no precedent. That Māori survived and
still exist is, however, no miracle, and Lindauer's portraits
depict Māori with their mana (authority) intact. Cultural
resilience was the force that enabled Māori to cope with the
transition from being people in a sovereign country to citizens of
a colony renamed New Zealand.
The protocols Māori people and the museum
sector use when managing the reproduction, dissemination and
interpretation of ancestral images is important in relation to
Lindauer's Māori portraits. In our world-view, Māori people are the
cultural stewards of things Māori.4 Auckland Art Gallery
Toi o Tāmaki is the formal guardian of Lindauer's 62 painted
portraits of Māori, gifted to Auckland City in 1915 by Lindauer's
patron Henry Partridge (1848-1931). The Gallery took some time to
appreciate its responsibilities as custodian. After Lindauer's
portraits had entered the collection, they were displayed at
Auckland City Art Gallery in the first half of the twentieth
century. They were, however, not then considered with the esteem in
which they are now held. The Gallery was establishing its
reputation as a centre of artistic excellence; it focused on
settler and colonial art and the new developments of art in New
Zealand. Introducing British modernism to New Zealand was
prioritised; international prints were collected and a
controversial exhibition of Henry Moore was opened in 1955. The
fact that Lindauer's portraits were viewed as having social and
historical importance but did not follow the contemporary styles of
art predominant in Britain and appreciated in New Zealand at this
time, led to their neglect. For reasons I will outline below, the
Gallery's position has meanwhile changed, and Lindauer's portraits
are recognised as taonga (treasures) that must be exhibited, cared
for and researched.
Crossing World Views
Although descendants do not 'own' Lindauer's
painted portraits in the care of galleries, museums and private
collectors, the paintings of ancestors in public and private
collections are considered part of a living Māori reality. Māori
descendants, scholars and stewards address them, weep over them and
share joy with them as if they were living beings. The figures in
the paintings are respected and beloved ancestors, and therefore
Māori create ceremonies for them, because in the Māori world-view
the mana of the portraits can be harmful to people from cultures
different from ours. Māori care about them and their impact on
people, because ancestral images are considered mediators between
the human and the supernatural world of Māori, which is inhabited
by good and bad spirit beings. We pay the portraits the same regard
we do cultural objects made by Māori people.5 It is the
duty of stewards to carry out appropriate rituals for the
well-being and cultural safety of people. The ceremonies, which
occur during the sharing of Lindauer's portraits, are moments of
cultural intersection which reveal to others the beauty of
difference. Meeting points of difference create tension, but also
opportunities for discussing perceptions, responses and discoveries
between the museum and our various groups of visitors, regarding
not only the painted images of ancestors as taonga but also the
role of the art world in the display of ancestral objects, their
interpretation and reproduction.
Over the past fifteen years Auckland Art
Gallery has established a process in which descendants of
Lindauer's sitters are asked for permission for their ancestor's
images to be reproduced in books across all academic disciplines,
on websites, or to be displayed for personal use in private homes.
Such requests come from descendants themselves, national and
international scholars, art galleries and museums, education
institutions, publishers, individuals and commercially interested
people. Auckland Art Gallery engages descendants in the permission
process because the Gallery sees the advantages of having a
relationship with living relatives. The co-operation is constantly
under review, but with trust and transparent stewardship practices
it is possible for all to benefit from the cultural respect for,
and stewardship of, the art objects. In the past, Lindauer's Māori
portraits were sometimes inappropriately used by tourist souvenir
makers and by marketing or promotion agencies. For example, the
portraits were printed onto tea towels, coffee cups and dinner
plates. Today, permissions for reproduction are obtained only by
Auckland Art Gallery, and we also determine the parameters for re
production. 6 Some requests are denied by the Gallery and
descendants; we do not allow, for instance, the digital alteration
of a portrait, the display of preserved heads or replicas of such
heads together with portraits, or the publication of misleading
texts accompanying reproductions of the paintings.
The notion of seeking permission to display or
reproduce images is not new in the museum sector and is underpinned
by copyright law. Descendants of the people painted 140 years ago
by Lindauer as well as museums and galleries who engage in
negotiations with them are required to pay constant attention to
the process. Such consultation creates positive relations
between Māori and the museum culture in Aotearoa New Zealand today,
as exchanges and relations improve institutional knowledge and the
understanding of our ancestors. The visitors also benefit from the
interpretation we are able to provide based on information from
descendants. In a global context, this permission process can also
be related to a growing awareness of and compliance with the 2007
United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous People,
which grants indigenous people the right to maintain and protect
their cultural heritage, including paintings, photographs, taonga
objects or architecture.7
The education of Europeans in a Māori
perspective on portraiture corresponds with the education of Māori
in European aesthetic conventions and paradigms. Being educated in
different cultural approaches is vital to fruitful museum and
gallery col laborations. The permission process recognises the
Māori belief system which regards images of ancestors - whether
painted by Lindauer or carved by a traditional Māori practitioner -
as carriers of mana. The mana of ancestors is crucial to Māori, and
the wrongful use of images denigrates the ancestors and detracts
from their mana as well as from the mana of the stewards or
descendants. The painted portraits of ancestors are imbued with
generations of mana, and their images are not only living, they are
linked to Māori DNA, history and cultural legacy. This is why Māori
and the Gallery consider Lindauer's paintings treasured
heirlooms.
Permission Precedents and Beyond
Asking permission is not a new idea for Māori
- it is a cultural practice handed down the generations. In the
museum context, however, with the intention to tour cultural
objects and images internationally it was pioneered by Hirini Moko
Mead during the preparation of the exhibition Te Maori: Maori
Art from New Zealand Collections (1984-1986).8
Descendant communities were approached to allow objects to travel
first to the United States of America and then to four museums in
Aotearoa New Zealand. The exhibition was a hugely successful
collaboration between Aotearoa New Zealand, United States museum
professionals and the Māori descendants who accompanied the taonga
on their journey around America.
Asking permission for taonga Māori (Māori
treasures) to travel was unprecedented at the time of Te
Maori. However, American art museums accepted this as
essential for the success of the exhibition in the United States.
Not all descendants gave their consent; nevertheless those taonga
that were authorised by descendants to tour received appropriate
blessings and ceremonies at their farewell, their installation in
the United States and welcome on their return home. The task of
interpreting the taonga in the Te Maori exhibition was
carried out by American and Māori professionals as well as
community descendants.
Te Maori permissions and the
ceremonies carried out during its tour proved to be an intensive
learning process for the American museum sector, but it was a
rewarding experience too. The lesson was that museums could adjust
conventions to accommodate different cultural values and processes:
Te Maori demonstrated to museums that collaboration,
understanding and respect for cultural difference was a win-win
situation. Aotearoa New Zealand institutions remain committed to
this principle.
Today the political conditions for permissions
have changed compared to those relevant in the twentieth century
and for the Te Maori exhibition. Such changes challenge
the notion of consultation and good intention. The tour of
Lindauer's portraits to Europe has received enthusiastic support
from the majority of descendants. They, together with tribal groups
and elders, have offered encouragement; they recognise that people
from the other side of the world will see the painted images of
their ancestors and understand that Māori continue to thrive in the
twenty-first century. These descendants have affirmed the
uniqueness of this moment in the history of the paintings,
especially because the Māori practice of performing rituals and
ceremonies will be followed through. However, not all descendants
have agreed to support the tour. This is not because the portraits
are leaving Aotearoa New Zealand and touring to Europe; rather, it
results from political issues related to the post-Treaty settlement
endeavours in which Māori tribes are currently engaged. The
political context of Lindauer's portraits throws into relief not
only the contemporary situation Māori live in, but also methods we
use to navigate a way forward as a consequence of Treaty
agreements, which are linked to indigenous rights movements
worldwide.
Thus, the display of paintings of Māori
ancestors in Berlin's prestigious Alte Nationalgalerie (Old
National Gallery) is a historic moment, because it is the first
occasion the paintings have left Aotearoa New Zealand en masse
since their creation. Moreover it reinforces the necessity to
employ the same cultural principles that were applied to those
taonga which travelled to the United States in the 1980s. In
Aotearoa New Zealand's art museum context Lindauer's portrait
paintings are works of art made in a European tradition, yet they
are also considered Māori taonga or beloved art treasures. This
meeting point of two traditions is thought to be provoking and
beneficial for inter-cultural development in the museum and gallery
field.
In October 2013, native Hawaiians, artists and
supporters of the arts protested against the misuse of a photograph
in the col lection of the Hawaii State Foundation on Culture and
the Arts (HSFCA). Francis Haar's (1908-1997) 1968 photograph of an
esteemed elder and renowned hula practitioner, Iolani Luahine
(1915-1978), a major cultural figure in the Hawaiian islands, was
improperly appropriated from the HSFCA's collection without
permission from the Haar estate or Luahine's family. Luahine's head
and hands were digitally erased from the image and the torso
reproduced on promotional posters, tote bags, T-shirts and coffee
mugs. This is not a situation unique to Hawaii, but it is a
reminder that even in today's climate of established indigenous
rights, the appropriate permission protocols to reproduce art
works, particularly of indigenous subjects, are frequently ignored.
When called to account, HSFCA took responsibility for their
actions, apologised and made amends.
The Western practice of collecting items of
material culture and capturing the image of indigenous peoples is a
matter of history. The range and number of historical paintings and
photo graphs of indigenous peoples in public and private
collections strongly demonstrate how the image of native peoples
was commercialised. This was noted by Gordon Brown and Hamish Keith
who, in An Introduction to New Zealand Painting 1839-1980,
quote art historian Eric Hall McCormick's (1906-1995) description
of the colonial period and the painting of Māori subjects as being
"laborious archaeologising".9
An example of appropriate consultation was
given by the Museum fur Volkerkunde (Museum of Ethnology) in
Hamburg, Germany. This museum is a steward of the Māori carved
meeting house Rauru.10 Together with the descendants of
the house builders and carvers (the knowledge keepers of the tribe
who are the cultural owners of the house), the museum as co-steward
worked collaboratively on all aspects of Rauru's history, including
its restoration in 2012. The museum has demonstrated that it is
committed to maintaining contact with the cultural owners so that
the lines of descent are not broken between people and a beloved
cultural house. The Museum of Ethnology learned that negotiations
take time - in Hamburg's case it took twenty years to develop a
productive relationship with descendants.
Relationships are important to indigenous
people; maintaining them takes time and is a shared responsibility
passed down the generations. Māori have a clear idea of how to work
together with non-indigenous professionals, researchers, museums,
galleries and education institutions in order to keep alive the
legacy of Māori stewardship of taonga. And they wish the world to
learn about Māori culture.
Restoring Rights to Māori
In the context of Aotearoa New Zealand, the
positioning of cultural treasures is connected to a history that
reaches back to Article 2 of the 1840 Tiriti o Waitangi (Treaty of
Waitangi), New Zealand's founding document. Since 1840, guiding
principles for interpreting the Treaty have resulted in an improved
understanding that supports Māori tino rangatiratanga (sovereignty)
and control of taonga (treasures) including tangible and intangible
assets. This position triggered a flood of Māori rights and
paralleled movements for change and political, social and cultural
visibility on the world stage.
During the 1960s and 1970s, protest efforts
gained world-wide attention, including the anti-Vietnam-War protest
movement and the African American civil rights movement. Much
closer to home, the exclusion of Māori rugby union football players
from rugby tours to South Africa exposed the New Zealand Government
to the anti-apartheid movement. Revolutionary change was imminent,
and Māori activists led the charge demonstrating for recognition,
land and human rights, and in doing so brought about a
transformation in political consciousness and recognition of Māori
as Treaty of Waitangi partners in practice, not just in name.
Between 1975 and 1978 three significant events occurred: the Māori
land march to Parliament (1975), the Bastion Point occupation
(1977) and the Raglan golf course occupation (1978) - all protests
against the Government who had taken these lands for public works.
The revitalisation of Māori language was followed closely by a
heightened visibility of Māori cultural identity, and the
re-energising of traditional roles in Māori communities and all
sectors of Aotearoa New Zealand's society.
These combined activities not only reclaimed
mana for Māori people, they also spurred growth and interest in New
Zealand's history, literature, music, performing arts, especially
Māori art and artists. As part of the Māori Renaissance in late
20th-century Aotearoa New Zealand, the museum sector gained profile
through exhibition activities, the most successful being the
previously mentioned Te Maori: Maori Art from New Zealand
Collections. During its display in the Auckland City Art
Gallery, all of Lindauer's Māori portraits were shown in the
welcoming gallery to the exhibition. In this space, rituals of
encounter and ceremonies were performed and exchanges took place
between visiting iwi (tribes), hap-a (subtribes), whanau (families)
and descendants. Lindauer's portraits were affirmed as cultural
treasures for all the Aotearoa New Zealand's people.
Indigenous Knowledge - A Way Forward
Museums and galleries are important agents in
the globalisation of art and culture. However, while it is one
thing to satisfy an interest in and curiosity about the ways of
life and material cultures of others through collecting, exhibiting
and interpreting items of their material culture, it is another
thing to re-contextualise such objects for new audiences and to
make them relevant in a constantly changing world. Perhaps the way
to a deeper understanding of cultural meaning through art and
objects is to recall their original functions. The museum field
needs a new conception of indigenous cultures and their material
lives, and this is best achieved by developing relationships with
indigenous people and working with their knowledge passed down the
generations.
As I have indicated, many of the cultures we
encounter through art and objects in galleries and museums are not
dead.11 They are alive, still expressing their concerns
and working creatively. In museums, cultural objects are removed
from their cultural contexts, and through this separation and new
placement they may cease to be activated by that culture. A way
forward is to understand that collected cultures in museums
represent moments in time. Yet they exist in a continuum because
they are linked to - and belong to - living peoples still located
and active in their places of origin.
Such knowledge and understanding are supported
by contemporary copyright laws, i.e. by assertions of legal and
cultural ownership. An example is The Native American Graves
Protection and Repatriation Act 1990 (NAGPRA), a United States
federal law. The Act requires federal agencies and institutions
that receive federal funding to return Native American 'cultural
items' to lineal descendants, to culturally affiliated Indian
tribes and Native Hawaiian organisations. Such cultural items
include human remains, funerary and sacred objects and objects of
cultural patrimony.12
The traditional practitioners and descendant
communities who take care of the knowledge linked to items such as
those covered by NAGPRA hold the key to re-activating them. They
are important in directing museums' engagement and interpreting the
treasures. If we follow Article 11 of the United Nations
Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous People, culture - inside
and outside the museum sector - is seen as an expanded idea that
encompasses all peoples. The experience of Auckland Art Gallery
impressively proves the fruitfulness of close co-operation with
descendants. Gottfried Lindauer's paintings are out of European
copyright, therefore the Gallery is by law entitled to reproduce,
interpret and exhibit them under the terms it decides. However, the
Gallery chooses to respectfully work with descendants, and not only
as far as permissions are concerned: the Gallery also practises
inclusivity regarding the artworks' interpretation. An example is
the 2013 Māori Television series Behind the
Brush,13 made in collaboration with Awa Films and
presented in the Berlin exhibition with German subtitles.
Audiences in Aotearoa New Zealand, and people
from descendant cultures in particular, confirm that the experience
of art is relevant to their world-view, and they look for
connectivity to the subject matter and to historical relevance of
the paintings rather than to the artistic refinements. There is a
demand from visitors for improved and authentic interpretation, and
the expertise does not necessarily reside in the museum.
Descendants have come to expect appropriate consultation and the
opportunity to maintain, protect and develop the past, present and
future manifestations of their cultures, which is also expressly
recommended by the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of
Indigenous People. It is worth repeating that the world is now in a
new era, and there is nothing to prohibit creative collaboration
that brings new meanings to artworks.
Nau te rourou, naku te rourou, ka ora
manuhiri
Nau te rakau, na.ku te rakau, ka mate te
hoariri.14
Ngahiraka Mason
First published in Gottfried Lindauer:
die Maori-portraits for the Nationalgalerie, Staatliche Museen
zu Berlin in collaboration with Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tāmaki;
edited by Udo Kittelmann und Britta Schmitz. Verlag der
Buchhandlung Walther König, 2014. Reprinted online with
the kind permission of the author and publishers.
1
Literally: "Pluck out the stars", which means in a
contemporary interpretation that one should focus on what yields
the best results and not be distracted by unimportant matters or
people. Hirini Moko Mead, and Neil Grove, Nga Pepeha a nga
Tipuna: The Sayings of the Ancestors, Wellington: Victoria
University Press, 2001, p.400.
2
Māori contact with Europeans began in the seventeenth
century with the Dutch explorer Abel Tasman, followed by James
Cook, an English explorer, in the eighteenth century.
3
Aotearoa is the original name for New Zealand,
literally meaning the 'land of the long white cloud'.
4
Haerewa is the name given to a Māori board of
artists, educators and scholars in the field of fine and heritage
arts who have played a critical role in ad vising Auckland Art
Gallery Toi o Tāmaki on Māori matters at local, national and
international levels since 1994.
5
See Sidney M. Mead, Maori Art on the World
Scene, Wellington: Ahua Design & Illustration Ltd and
Matau Associates Ltd, 1997. A number of Mead's essays discuss
historical and modern examples of proper stewardship and the
consequences of improper stewardship.
6
For example, overprinting a portrait is not
permitted, and where cropping is culturally appropriate, the full
image must be reproduced in the publication.
7
Article 11 of the United Nations Declaration on the
Rights of Indigenous People reads: "Indigenous peoples have the
right to practice and revitalize their cultural traditions and
customs. This includes the right to maintain, protect and develop
the past, present and future manifestations of their cultures, such
as archaeological and historical sites, artefacts, designs,
ceremonies, technologies and visual and performing arts and
literature". Online: http://www. un.org/esa/socdev/unpfll/
documents/ DRIPS_en.pdf, accessed 5 May 2014.
8
The exhibition Te Maori: Maori Art from New
Zealand Collections travelled to the Metropolitan Museum of
Art in New York (September 1984), Saint Louis Art Museum
(February-May 1985), the M. H. de Young Memorial Museum in San
Francisco (July-September 1985), and the Field Museum in Chicago
(March-June 1986). Te Maori: Te Hokinga Mai, the New
Zealand version of the exhibition, toured the country from 1986
starting at the National Museum, Wellington (August-October 1986),
Otago Museum, Dunedin (November 1986-February 1987) and the Robert
McDougall Art Gallery, Christchurch (March-May 1987) and finally to
the Auckland Art Gallery (June-September 1987).
9
Gordon Brown and Hamish Keith, An Introduction to
New Zealand Painting 1839-1980, Auckland: William Collins
Publishers Ltd, 1982, p. 70.
10
Rauru, the carved Meeting House, is the work of the
celebrated Te Arawa carver Tene Waitere (1853/54-1931) of Ngati
Tārawhai.
11
The Five Māori Painters exhibition from 21
February until 15 June 2014 at Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tāmaki
showcased Māori painting from pre-colonial rock art to contemporary
practice.
12
See Online:
http://indian-affairs.org/programs/aaia_repatriation_nagpra.htm,
accessed 12 July 2014.
13
Behind the Brush was initiated by Director
Julian Arahanga in collaboration with Indigenous Curator, Māori
Art, Ngahiraka Mason, on behalf of Auckland Art Gallery Toi o
Tāmaki.
14
"Cooperative energy succeeds where individual efforts
are insufficient" would be an adequate modern translation of this
proverb. Its ancestral meaning is "By your food basket and mine the
guests will be satisfied with food; by your weapon and mine the
enemy will be destroyed." Hirini Moko Mead and Neil Grove, Nga
Pepeha a nga Tipuna, Wellington: Victoria University Press,
2001, p. 319.
Shared Legacies
Tikarohia nga whetu 1
Contemporary Māori live in different cultural circumstances
compared to our ancestors depicted in the nineteenth-century by
Bohemian artist Gottfried Lindauer (1839-1926); and we are the
proud modern descendants of that past. To positively add to our
cultural legacies Māori share the historical and living evidence of
our ancestors' productive lives. We reflect on how our forebears
responded to rapid changes during the European colonising expansion
and to the related attempts to subjugate non-European peoples with
European ideologies during the nineteenth century.2
These responses inform a modern narrative of colonisation, which is
continually being constructed, critiqued and re-constructed.
This essay is written from the perspective of a Māori art museum
professional and steward of Gottfried Lindauer's Māori portraits.
My perspective, as both a Māori and a museum professional, is
grounded in the experience of two systems of know ledge - Māori
and European. It is from this position that I understand and will
explain what Lindauer's portraits represent, why Māori care about
them and what they mean to us in our contemporary lives. Cultural
interactions between Māori and the museums (as institutional
stewards of Māori portraits) create a fertile ground for
cross-cultural understanding. The historical Aotearoa (original
name for New Zealand) New Zealand context in which Lindauer worked
is important to consider when seeking to understand the
significance of this artist's Māori portraits, as is the historical
milieu from which his painting style originates.
Māori ancestors' social, political and cultural lives
intersected with the mass migration of European settlers to
Aotearoa New Zealand.3 Missionaries and traders began
arriving in Aotearoa New Zealand in the late 1700s. Immigration was
steady from the 1820s onwards, two decades before colonisation was
made 'official' through the 1840 Treaty of Waitangi, and Aotearoa
New Zealand became a destination for people from many nations and
regions, including England, Scotland, Ireland, Germany, Belgium,
Austria and Bohemia. During the first fifty years of contact be
tween Māori and European immigrants and up to the time when
Lindauer started painting his Māori portraits in the mid-1870s,
Māori were noted for successfully responding to changes for which
they knew no precedent. That Māori survived and still exist is,
however, no miracle, and Lindauer's portraits depict Māori with
their mana (authority) intact. Cultural resilience was the force
that enabled Māori to cope with the transition from being people in
a sovereign country to citizens of a colony renamed New
Zealand.
The protocols Māori people and the museum sector use when
managing the reproduction, dissemination and interpretation of
ancestral images is important in relation to Lindauer's Māori
portraits. In our world-view, Māori people are the cultural
stewards of things Māori.4 Auckland Art Gallery Toi o
Tāmaki is the formal guardian of Lindauer's 62 painted portraits of
Māori, gifted to Auckland City in 1915 by Lindauer's patron Henry
Partridge (1848-1931). The Gallery took some time to appreciate its
responsibilities as custodian. After Lindauer's portraits had
entered the collection, they were displayed at Auckland City Art
Gallery in the first half of the twentieth century. They were,
however, not then considered with the esteem in which they are now
held. The Gallery was establishing its reputation as a centre of
artistic excellence; it focused on settler and colonial art and the
new developments of art in New Zealand. Introducing British
modernism to New Zealand was prioritised; international prints were
collected and a controversial exhibition of Henry Moore was opened
in 1955. The fact that Lindauer's portraits were viewed as having
social and historical importance but did not follow the
contemporary styles of art predominant in Britain and appreciated
in New Zealand at this time, led to their neglect. For reasons I
will outline below, the Gallery's position has meanwhile changed,
and Lindauer's portraits are recognised as taonga (treasures) that
must be exhibited, cared for and researched.
Crossing World Views
Although descendants do not 'own' Lindauer's painted portraits
in the care of galleries, museums and private collectors, the
paintings of ancestors in public and private collections are
considered part of a living Māori reality. Māori descendants,
scholars and stewards address them, weep over them and share joy
with them as if they were living beings. The figures in the
paintings are respected and beloved ancestors, and therefore Māori
create ceremonies for them, because in the Māori world-view the
mana of the portraits can be harmful to people from cultures
different from ours. Māori care about them and their impact on
people, because ancestral images are considered mediators between
the human and the supernatural world of Māori, which is inhabited
by good and bad spirit beings. We pay the portraits the same regard
we do cultural objects made by Māori people.5 It is the
duty of stewards to carry out appropriate rituals for the
well-being and cultural safety of people. The ceremonies, which
occur during the sharing of Lindauer's portraits, are moments of
cultural intersection which reveal to others the beauty of
difference. Meeting points of difference create tension, but also
opportunities for discussing perceptions, responses and discoveries
between the museum and our various groups of visitors, regarding
not only the painted images of ancestors as taonga but also the
role of the art world in the display of ancestral objects, their
interpretation and reproduction.
Over the past fifteen years Auckland Art Gallery has established
a process in which descendants of Lindauer's sitters are asked for
permission for their ancestor's images to be reproduced in books
across all academic disciplines, on websites, or to be displayed
for personal use in private homes. Such requests come from
descendants themselves, national and international scholars, art
galleries and museums, education institutions, publishers,
individuals and commercially interested people. Auckland Art
Gallery engages descendants in the permission process because the
Gallery sees the advantages of having a relationship with living
relatives. The co-operation is constantly under review, but with
trust and transparent stewardship practices it is possible for all
to benefit from the cultural respect for, and stewardship of, the
art objects. In the past, Lindauer's Māori portraits were sometimes
inappropriately used by tourist souvenir makers and by marketing or
promotion agencies. For example, the portraits were printed onto
tea towels, coffee cups and dinner plates. Today, permissions for
reproduction are obtained only by Auckland Art Gallery, and we also
determine the parameters for re production. 6 Some requests are
denied by the Gallery and descendants; we do not allow, for
instance, the digital alteration of a portrait, the display of
preserved heads or replicas of such heads together with portraits,
or the publication of misleading texts accompanying reproductions
of the paintings.
The notion of seeking permission to display or reproduce images
is not new in the museum sector and is underpinned by copyright
law. Descendants of the people painted 140 years ago by Lindauer as
well as museums and galleries who engage in negotiations with them
are required to pay constant attention to the process. Such
consultation creates positive relations between Māori and the
museum culture in Aotearoa New Zealand today, as exchanges and
relations improve institutional knowledge and the understanding of
our ancestors. The visitors also benefit from the interpretation we
are able to provide based on information from descendants. In a
global context, this permission process can also be related to a
growing awareness of and compliance with the 2007 United Nations
Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous People, which grants
indigenous people the right to maintain and protect their cultural
heritage, including paintings, photographs, taonga objects or
architecture.7
The education of Europeans in a Māori perspective on portraiture
corresponds with the education of Māori in European aesthetic
conventions and paradigms. Being educated in different cultural
approaches is vital to fruitful museum and gallery col
laborations. The permission process recognises the Māori belief
system which regards images of ancestors - whether painted by
Lindauer or carved by a traditional Māori practitioner - as
carriers of mana. The mana of ancestors is crucial to Māori, and
the wrongful use of images denigrates the ancestors and detracts
from their mana as well as from the mana of the stewards or
descendants. The painted portraits of ancestors are imbued with
generations of mana, and their images are not only living, they are
linked to Māori DNA, history and cultural legacy. This is why Māori
and the Gallery consider Lindauer's paintings treasured
heirlooms.
Permission Precedents and Beyond
Asking permission is not a new idea for Māori - it is a cultural
practice handed down the generations. In the museum context,
however, with the intention to tour cultural objects and images
internationally it was pioneered by Hirini Moko Mead during the
preparation of the exhibition Te Maori: Maori Art from New
Zealand Collections (1984-1986).8 Descendant
communities were approached to allow objects to travel first to the
United States of America and then to four museums in Aotearoa New
Zealand. The exhibition was a hugely successful collaboration
between Aotearoa New Zealand, United States museum professionals
and the Māori descendants who accompanied the taonga on their
journey around America.
Asking permission for taonga Māori (Māori treasures) to travel
was unprecedented at the time of Te Maori. However,
American art museums accepted this as essential for the success of
the exhibition in the United States. Not all descendants gave their
consent; nevertheless those taonga that were authorised by
descendants to tour received appropriate blessings and ceremonies
at their farewell, their installation in the United States and
welcome on their return home. The task of interpreting the taonga
in the Te Maori exhibition was carried out by American and
Māori professionals as well as community descendants.
Te Maori permissions and the ceremonies carried out
during its tour proved to be an intensive learning process for the
American museum sector, but it was a rewarding experience too. The
lesson was that museums could adjust conventions to accommodate
different cultural values and processes: Te Maori
demonstrated to museums that collaboration, understanding and
respect for cultural difference was a win-win situation. Aotearoa
New Zealand institutions remain committed to this principle.
Today the political conditions for permissions have changed
compared to those relevant in the twentieth century and for the
Te Maori exhibition. Such changes challenge the notion of
consultation and good intention. The tour of Lindauer's portraits
to Europe has received enthusiastic support from the majority of
descendants. They, together with tribal groups and elders, have
offered encouragement; they recognise that people from the other
side of the world will see the painted images of their ancestors
and understand that Māori continue to thrive in the twenty-first
century. These descendants have affirmed the uniqueness of this
moment in the history of the paintings, especially because the
Māori practice of performing rituals and ceremonies will be
followed through. However, not all descendants have agreed to
support the tour. This is not because the portraits are leaving
Aotearoa New Zealand and touring to Europe; rather, it results from
political issues related to the post-Treaty settlement endeavours
in which Māori tribes are currently engaged. The political context
of Lindauer's portraits throws into relief not only the
contemporary situation Māori live in, but also methods we use to
navigate a way forward as a consequence of Treaty agreements, which
are linked to indigenous rights movements worldwide.
Thus, the display of paintings of Māori ancestors in Berlin's
prestigious Alte Nationalgalerie (Old National Gallery) is a
historic moment, because it is the first occasion the paintings
have left Aotearoa New Zealand en masse since their creation.
Moreover it reinforces the necessity to employ the same cultural
principles that were applied to those taonga which travelled to the
United States in the 1980s. In Aotearoa New Zealand's art museum
context Lindauer's portrait paintings are works of art made in a
European tradition, yet they are also considered Māori taonga or
beloved art treasures. This meeting point of two traditions is
thought to be provoking and beneficial for inter-cultural
development in the museum and gallery field.
In October 2013, native Hawaiians, artists and supporters of the
arts protested against the misuse of a photograph in the col
lection of the Hawaii State Foundation on Culture and the Arts
(HSFCA). Francis Haar's (1908-1997) 1968 photograph of an esteemed
elder and renowned hula practitioner, Iolani Luahine (1915-1978), a
major cultural figure in the Hawaiian islands, was improperly
appropriated from the HSFCA's collection without permission from
the Haar estate or Luahine's family. Luahine's head and hands were
digitally erased from the image and the torso reproduced on
promotional posters, tote bags, T-shirts and coffee mugs. This is
not a situation unique to Hawaii, but it is a reminder that even in
today's climate of established indigenous rights, the appropriate
permission protocols to reproduce art works, particularly of
indigenous subjects, are frequently ignored. When called to
account, HSFCA took responsibility for their actions, apologised
and made amends.
The Western practice of collecting items of material culture and
capturing the image of indigenous peoples is a matter of history.
The range and number of historical paintings and photo graphs of
indigenous peoples in public and private collections strongly
demonstrate how the image of native peoples was commercialised.
This was noted by Gordon Brown and Hamish Keith who, in An
Introduction to New Zealand Painting 1839-1980, quote art
historian Eric Hall McCormick's (1906-1995) description of the
colonial period and the painting of Māori subjects as being
"laborious archaeologising".9
An example of appropriate consultation was given by the Museum
fur Volkerkunde (Museum of Ethnology) in Hamburg, Germany. This
museum is a steward of the Māori carved meeting house
Rauru.10 Together with the descendants of the house
builders and carvers (the knowledge keepers of the tribe who are
the cultural owners of the house), the museum as co-steward worked
collaboratively on all aspects of Rauru's history, including its
restoration in 2012. The museum has demonstrated that it is
committed to maintaining contact with the cultural owners so that
the lines of descent are not broken between people and a beloved
cultural house. The Museum of Ethnology learned that negotiations
take time - in Hamburg's case it took twenty years to develop a
productive relationship with descendants.
Relationships are important to indigenous people; maintaining
them takes time and is a shared responsibility passed down the
generations. Māori have a clear idea of how to work together with
non-indigenous professionals, researchers, museums, galleries and
education institutions in order to keep alive the legacy of Māori
stewardship of taonga. And they wish the world to learn about Māori
culture.
Restoring Rights to Māori
In the context of Aotearoa New Zealand, the positioning of
cultural treasures is connected to a history that reaches back to
Article 2 of the 1840 Tiriti o Waitangi (Treaty of Waitangi), New
Zealand's founding document. Since 1840, guiding principles for
interpreting the Treaty have resulted in an improved understanding
that supports Māori tino rangatiratanga (sovereignty) and control
of taonga (treasures) including tangible and intangible assets.
This position triggered a flood of Māori rights and paralleled
movements for change and political, social and cultural visibility
on the world stage.
During the 1960s and 1970s, protest efforts gained world-wide
attention, including the anti-Vietnam-War protest movement and the
African American civil rights movement. Much closer to home, the
exclusion of Māori rugby union football players from rugby tours to
South Africa exposed the New Zealand Government to the
anti-apartheid movement. Revolutionary change was imminent, and
Māori activists led the charge demonstrating for recognition, land
and human rights, and in doing so brought about a transformation in
political consciousness and recognition of Māori as Treaty of
Waitangi partners in practice, not just in name. Between 1975 and
1978 three significant events occurred: the Māori land march to
Parliament (1975), the Bastion Point occupation (1977) and the
Raglan golf course occupation (1978) - all protests against the
Government who had taken these lands for public works. The
revitalisation of Māori language was followed closely by a
heightened visibility of Māori cultural identity, and the
re-energising of traditional roles in Māori communities and all
sectors of Aotearoa New Zealand's society.
These combined activities not only reclaimed mana for Māori
people, they also spurred growth and interest in New Zealand's
history, literature, music, performing arts, especially Māori art
and artists. As part of the Māori Renaissance in late 20th-century
Aotearoa New Zealand, the museum sector gained profile through
exhibition activities, the most successful being the previously
mentioned Te Maori: Maori Art from New Zealand
Collections. During its display in the Auckland City Art
Gallery, all of Lindauer's Māori portraits were shown in the
welcoming gallery to the exhibition. In this space, rituals of
encounter and ceremonies were performed and exchanges took place
between visiting iwi (tribes), hap-a (subtribes), whanau (families)
and descendants. Lindauer's portraits were affirmed as cultural
treasures for all the Aotearoa New Zealand's people.
Indigenous Knowledge - A Way Forward
Museums and galleries are important agents in the globalisation
of art and culture. However, while it is one thing to satisfy an
interest in and curiosity about the ways of life and material
cultures of others through collecting, exhibiting and interpreting
items of their material culture, it is another thing to
re-contextualise such objects for new audiences and to make them
relevant in a constantly changing world. Perhaps the way to a
deeper understanding of cultural meaning through art and objects is
to recall their original functions. The museum field needs a new
conception of indigenous cultures and their material lives, and
this is best achieved by developing relationships with indigenous
people and working with their knowledge passed down the
generations.
As I have indicated, many of the cultures we encounter through
art and objects in galleries and museums are not dead.11
They are alive, still expressing their concerns and working
creatively. In museums, cultural objects are removed from their
cultural contexts, and through this separation and new placement
they may cease to be activated by that culture. A way forward is to
understand that collected cultures in museums represent moments in
time. Yet they exist in a continuum because they are linked to -
and belong to - living peoples still located and active in their
places of origin.
Such knowledge and understanding are supported by contemporary
copyright laws, i.e. by assertions of legal and cultural ownership.
An example is The Native American Graves Protection and
Repatriation Act 1990 (NAGPRA), a United States federal law. The
Act requires federal agencies and institutions that receive federal
funding to return Native American 'cultural items' to lineal
descendants, to culturally affiliated Indian tribes and Native
Hawaiian organisations. Such cultural items include human remains,
funerary and sacred objects and objects of cultural
patrimony.12
The traditional practitioners and descendant communities who
take care of the knowledge linked to items such as those covered by
NAGPRA hold the key to re-activating them. They are important in
directing museums' engagement and interpreting the treasures. If we
follow Article 11 of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights
of Indigenous People, culture - inside and outside the museum
sector - is seen as an expanded idea that encompasses all peoples.
The experience of Auckland Art Gallery impressively proves the
fruitfulness of close co-operation with descendants. Gottfried
Lindauer's paintings are out of European copyright, therefore the
Gallery is by law entitled to reproduce, interpret and exhibit them
under the terms it decides. However, the Gallery chooses to
respectfully work with descendants, and not only as far as
permissions are concerned: the Gallery also practises inclusivity
regarding the artworks' interpretation. An example is the 2013
Māori Television series Behind the Brush,13
made in collaboration with Awa Films and presented in the Berlin
exhibition with German subtitles.
Audiences in Aotearoa New Zealand, and people from descendant
cultures in particular, confirm that the experience of art is
relevant to their world-view, and they look for connectivity to the
subject matter and to historical relevance of the paintings rather
than to the artistic refinements. There is a demand from visitors
for improved and authentic interpretation, and the expertise does
not necessarily reside in the museum. Descendants have come to
expect appropriate consultation and the opportunity to maintain,
protect and develop the past, present and future manifestations of
their cultures, which is also expressly recommended by the United
Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous People. It is worth
repeating that the world is now in a new era, and there is nothing
to prohibit creative collaboration that brings new meanings to
artworks.
Nau te rourou, naku te rourou, ka ora manuhiri
Nau te rakau, na.ku te rakau, ka mate te
hoariri.14
Ngahiraka Mason
First published in Gottfried Lindauer: die
Maori-portraits for the Nationalgalerie, Staatliche Museen zu
Berlin in collaboration with Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tāmaki;
edited by Udo Kittelmann und Britta Schmitz. Verlag der
Buchhandlung Walther König, 2014. Reprinted online with
the kind permission of the author and publishers.
1 Literally:
"Pluck out the stars", which means in a contemporary interpretation
that one should focus on what yields the best results and not be
distracted by unimportant matters or people. Hirini Moko Mead, and
Neil Grove, Nga Pepeha a nga Tipuna: The Sayings of the
Ancestors, Wellington: Victoria University Press, 2001,
p.400.
2 Māori contact
with Europeans began in the seventeenth century with the Dutch
explorer Abel Tasman, followed by James Cook, an English explorer,
in the eighteenth century.
3 Aotearoa is
the original name for New Zealand, literally meaning the 'land of
the long white cloud'.
4 Haerewa is the
name given to a Māori board of artists, educators and scholars in
the field of fine and heritage arts who have played a critical role
in ad vising Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tāmaki on Māori matters at
local, national and international levels since 1994.
5 See Sidney M.
Mead, Maori Art on the World Scene, Wellington: Ahua
Design & Illustration Ltd and Matau Associates Ltd, 1997. A
number of Mead's essays discuss historical and modern examples of
proper stewardship and the consequences of improper
stewardship.
6 For example,
overprinting a portrait is not permitted, and where cropping is
culturally appropriate, the full image must be reproduced in the
publication.
7 Article 11 of
the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous People
reads: "Indigenous peoples have the right to practice and
revitalize their cultural traditions and customs. This includes the
right to maintain, protect and develop the past, present and future
manifestations of their cultures, such as archaeological and
historical sites, artefacts, designs, ceremonies, technologies and
visual and performing arts and literature". Online: http://www.
un.org/esa/socdev/unpfll/ documents/ DRIPS_en.pdf, accessed 5 May
2014.
8 The exhibition
Te Maori: Maori Art from New Zealand Collections travelled
to the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York (September 1984),
Saint Louis Art Museum (February-May 1985), the M. H. de Young
Memorial Museum in San Francisco (July-September 1985), and the
Field Museum in Chicago (March-June 1986). Te Maori: Te Hokinga
Mai, the New Zealand version of the exhibition, toured the
country from 1986 starting at the National Museum, Wellington
(August-October 1986), Otago Museum, Dunedin (November
1986-February 1987) and the Robert McDougall Art Gallery,
Christchurch (March-May 1987) and finally to the Auckland Art
Gallery (June-September 1987).
9 Gordon Brown
and Hamish Keith, An Introduction to New Zealand Painting
1839-1980, Auckland: William Collins Publishers Ltd, 1982, p.
70.
10 Rauru, the carved Meeting House, is
the work of the celebrated Te Arawa carver Tene Waitere
(1853/54-1931) of Ngati Tārawhai.
11 The Five Māori Painters
exhibition from 21 February until 15 June 2014 at Auckland Art
Gallery Toi o Tāmaki showcased Māori painting from pre-colonial
rock art to contemporary practice.
12 See Online:
http://indian-affairs.org/programs/aaia_repatriation_nagpra.htm,
accessed 12 July 2014.
13 Behind the Brush was
initiated by Director Julian Arahanga in collaboration with
Indigenous Curator, Māori Art, Ngahiraka Mason, on behalf of
Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tāmaki.
14 "Cooperative energy succeeds where
individual efforts are insufficient" would be an adequate modern
translation of this proverb. Its ancestral meaning is "By your food
basket and mine the guests will be satisfied with food; by your
weapon and mine the enemy will be destroyed." Hirini Moko Mead and
Neil Grove, Nga Pepeha a nga Tipuna, Wellington: Victoria
University Press, 2001, p. 319.