Ko te reo te mauri o te mana Māori and Te Ao Mārama Collection art exhibition at New Zealand Parliament

Ko te reo te mauri o te mana Māori, Ko te kupu te mauri o te reo Māori (The language is the life force of the mana Māori, the word is the life force of the language) acknowledges the 50th anniversary of the 1972 petition to Parliament calling for active recognition of the Māori language.

 The name of this exhibition is based on a whakataukī by Tā Hēmi Henare, spoken at the Waitangi Tribunal in 1985.

“Ko te reo te mauri o te mana Māori.
Ko te kupu te mauri o te reo Māori.
E rua ēnei wehenga kōrero
e hāngai tonu ana ki runga i te reo Māori.
Ko te reo nō te Atua mai.”

“The language is the life force of the mana Māori.
The word is the life force of the language.
These two ideas are absolutely crucial to the Māori language.
A language that is a gift to us from God.”

Artists Lorraine King, Tash Nikora, and Te Hemo Ata Henare have chosen this whakataukī as the catalyst and inspiration for their work as it acknowledges the petition that took place, and the key role it played. Through their artwork, the artists show that even though they are all at different points on their journey to learning Te Reo, their reo Māori capacity continues to grow.

For the artists, their work holds messages that carry on through generations. The journey of Te Reo is a visual narrative and through Nga Toi we celebrate the unwritten language.

Nikora is a contemporary multi-disciplinary artist who has demonstrated her dedication to learning and practicing customary techniques of tāmoko. For Nikora, tāmoko has been a catalyst of establishing connections to many cultures and artists worldwide.

Henare is a customary practitioner of Ngā Mahi a Te Whare Pora (the products and processes of the house of weaving) and uses natural materials such as houhere (lacebark), pingao (ficinia spiralis), kiekie (freycinetia banksia) and kōrari (phormium tenax).

“I weave because it is part of my lineage it’s something that has been inheritably part of my inner being, to weave the transmission of knowledge is instinctively linked to the past present and future… as a practitioner, I have an obligation to ensure the survival of our tāonga,” says Henare.

King draws inspiration to express who she is using traditional artforms of her heritage. She uses paint as her medium to explore her own visual narratives that connect the old with the new.

For this exhibition, Ko te reo te mauri o te mana Māori will be presented alongside eight highlights from the Parliamentary Collection – Te Ao Mārama. This collection features works by renowned Māori artists Cliff Whiting, Bob Jahnke, Robyn Kahukiwa, Te Aue Davis, Fred Graham, Sandy Adsett, Darcy Nicholas, and Aromea Tahiwi.

These works were commissioned in the 1990s for Te Ao Mārama, the name given to the temporary Māori Affairs Select Committee Room in Bowen House while Parliament House and Parliamentary library were refurbished.

We are excited to bring these together again to celebrate the centenary of Matangireia, the original Māori Affairs Select Committee Room in Parliament House.