The Island of Mokoia, the head of a sunken volcano which is named Lake Rotorua to tourists today.
Ko Rotoruanui A Kahumatamoemoe Ko Te Moana
For us, the energy of its Lifeforce contained in the name opens a door to our spirit world. Islands beneath islands woven into oral stories from the heaven and earth of Poutama and the old chiefs.
Culture can link a homeland through practises of art and performance from across worlds when our journey ultimately leads us home.
Knowledge passed down orally about sacred volcanic lands gave life and land a connection through memory to our surrounding resources. Enriching the spiritual attachment we have to birthplace is that connection with spirits older than us.
The branches of a family tree evolve above deep set roots in the land of Tangatawhenua. The multigeneration weaving of oral and visual knowledge from parent and siblings to child are balanced by older knowledge of grandparents, and great grandparents’ whose rank and roles were scaffolding on a tribal scale steeped in old Maori ritual and custom beyond the church.
The evolution of korua blood is a story of two families that make one. It describes the rebirth of twins a brother and a sister destined to repeat their paths until they succeed in moving the spirit of their ancestral canoe. She the holder of the vessel and he the warrior guarding her journey through human life.
Ripeka's Walking Stix is a way of balancing the wairua between two opposing families forever forbidden to war by the joining of blood and gift.
Amongst the hidden wakahuia of carved stilts the gift to dream with the universe. Twin Hei Tiki representing the womb at work guide the imbilical cord back through time to Hawaikinui
Mountain Weaving binds spirit to whakapapa on Tangatawhenua land. By awakening our mountain spirits, above and beneath the waters, our sounds echo to introduce the presence of life and spirit older than ourselves. Nature herself provides her own knowledge to quests of a human nature woven by time.
To weave Maori whakapapa like a blanket was to flow like water and bath in lore and myth from within the world of Poutama.
Pekehaua & Tarimano bound by talisman and totemic ritualism to an old time when taniwha hunted Maori, and The Pacific was a story of Eden to discover.
One an old stone spirit of great karakia imbedded deep into volcanic soil of Awahou as pillar and witness to our wairua above land.
The other, a reptile who had fed upon our flesh and bones generations before. He, Pekehaua who hunted man was hunted in turn, and ritually sacrificed to absorb his animal spirit as a Reptile Hunter.
We the descendants acknowledge the ancient reptilian spirit of Pekehaua as taonga of our mokopuna by way of guarding and protecting in spirit.