Brett Graham: Tai Moana Tai Tangata

Curated by Dr Anna-Marie White (Te Ātiawa)

The Govett-Brewster Art Gallery/Len Lye Centre proudly presents a major installation of new artworks by Brett Graham (Ngāti Koroki-Kahukura, Tainui), the leading contemporary Māori artist on the world’s stage.

Graham spent six weeks in Taranaki, on the North Island’s rugged West Coast, as 2019 Govett-Brewster Artist in Residence, with support from Creative New Zealand. During his residency, the artist researched the history of the relationship between the Māori tribes of Taranaki and Tainui, and his own whakapapa links to the area, connecting with tangata whenua and his extended whanau, and focusing on the pact of solidarity forged during the New Zealand Wars, a relationship known as Te Kīwai o te Kete.

Engaging the architecture of colonial frontier warfare, and the language of war memorials in times of peace, Tai Moana Tai Tangata occupies the entire Govett-Brewster Art Gallery. Three panoramic landscape films establish the geography of the exhibition within Aotearoa New Zealand, from Manukau in the north to Ohawe in the south, while five monumental sculptures are situated within this territory.

“Brett Graham’s monumental sculptures function as historic memorials, yet refuse to settle in the past,” says the exhibition’s curator, Dr Anna-Marie White (Te Ātiawa).

“Launching from experiences shared by Taranaki and Tainui through the process of colonisation, these works cast the lessons learned by our ancestors into the future. Stripped of the optimism conveyed in the teachings of nineteenth century Taranaki leaders, these prophetic visions clothe our future in doubt.”

The works are imbued with narratives on multiple layers, from direct references to place and architectural objects through to important historic stories, and a prophetic view of the future.

Govett-Brewster Art Gallery Acting Director Antony Rhodes says: “Brett Graham is an internationally-acclaimed contemporary Māori artist who tuned his focus to the history of Taranaki. The scale and depth of Tai Moana Tai Tangata presents a formidable experience that connects the local landscape to the nationally significant events that took place within it.”

“Graham has produced both an extraordinary exhibition of new work tailored specifically to the Govett-Brewster Art Gallery, and an exhibition that speaks directly to the people of Taranaki, and is of relevance to all New Zealanders and nations balancing multiple viewpoints of past and present.”

A comprehensive publication contextualising this new body of work in relation to Graham’s practice will be published in May 2021. Contact the Govett-Brewster Store to secure your copy.

Also showing:

Len Lye: Tangibles 1959-1961
Len Lye: Sky Snakes
Maioha Kara: Salutations
Meg Porteous: Germinal centre

About the Govett-Brewster Art Gallery/Len Lye Centre:
Since 1970 the Govett-Brewster Art Gallery has been presenting and collecting exceptional contemporary art with an emphasis on Aotearoa New Zealand and the Pacific. In 2015 the Len Lye Centre – the nation’s first museum dedicated to a single artist—opened as part of the gallery.

Owned and operated by the New Plymouth District Council, the Govett-Brewster works in partnership with the Govett-Brewster Foundation and Len Lye Foundation, which owns and governs the Len Lye Collection and Archive housed at the gallery.