He Whakaaraara - An Awakening 
       14 December 07 - 13 April 08 

Taonga Exhibition opens for four months – a wide range of items from the museum’s 1,500 + piece taonga collection are on display.  Find out what staff learnt about the state of the collection in its first audit of the Maori taonga collection since the 1950s.

The Carver and the Artist Book Launch:

You are welcome to join us at the museum on Wednesday 26 March 2008 for the launching of Damian Skinner’s book The Carver and the Artist: Maori Art in the Twentieth Century, published by Auckland University Press.

In The Carver and the Artist Damian Skinner charts the growth and development of the new forms of Maori art that emerged from the rapid urbanisation of Maori in the mid-twentieth century. He tells the story of the customary culture championed by Apirana Ngata at the Rotorua School of Maori Arts and Crafts, and how artists like Arnold Wilson, Para Matchitt and Selwyn Muru, encouraged by Gordon Tovey and the Education Department, reacted against this and constructed a Maori art that engaged with the modern world in which they lived. There was a rich trafficking between tradition and modernism – two seemingly incompatible but not always opposing positions that were the source of a great upswelling of creativity.

Damian moved to Gisborne in February 2007, and he is working with Tairawhiti Museum to develop the new permanent history exhibition titled Watersheds: Historic Rivers of Tairawhiti. He is a well-known art historian and curator who has written about a variety of Maori and Pakeha artists. Metaphysical Heart: Jewellery by Peter McKay, which was curated by Damian, is opening at the museum in April 2008.

The launch will begin at 5.30pm, and will also include the opportunity to take part in a guided tour of the taonga exhibition. Dr Sam Elworthy, the director of Auckland University Press will be attending, and the book will be officially launched by Jody Wylie, curator of taonga Maori at Tairawhiti Museum.