Poroporoaki (Farewell)

This essay originally appeared in New Zealand Art at Te Papa (Te Papa Press, 2018).

Hariata Ropata-Tangahoe delves into genealogical narratives of her people and place, her vision strengthened by her Māori as well as her Welsh and Italian heritage. She embraces Māori belief systems to highlight the permeable veil between Te Ao Mārama, the world of light and the living, and Te Pō, the world of night and death.

Ropata-Tangahoe has a naïve style and often paints autobiographically. While otherworldly figures in her work might reflect important ancestors, kōrero-a-iwi, or stories of place, in Poroporoaki (Farewell) she places herself within the hand-carved frame made by her long-time carving collaborator Len Taylor. She is dressed according to the protocols of tangihanga, the final formal farewell conducted at one’s passing. The tones of her attire suggest te mana o ngā atua wāhine (the authority of female spiritual entities), particularly the deep earth hues of Papatūānuku (the land or mother-earth figure). Ropata-Tangahoe delicately veils her face with tulle, pearls and stars, against a kurawaka (earth-coloured) red halo that activates the sacred realm of Hineahuone (the female element who comes from the soil) and her daughter Hinetītama, who became Hinenuitepō (the female entity of death and the night). As a Māori woman and mother, Ropata-Tangahoe represents all these godly attributes.

Why is Ropata-Tangahoe in nineteenth-century dress, wearing kid-leather gloves and holding a clematis-like wreath? The work responds to a shameful incident when a bulldozer’s blade disturbed a nineteenth-century wāhi tapu (sacred burial area) on the Kapiti coast. The wreath makes direct reference to Puanga (Rigel in the constellation Orion) — a significant star seen during the Māori new year and whose mythic daughter, Puawānanga, is named for the white clematis flower. When the resting places of these ancestors were uncovered, Ropata-Tangahoe took actions of kaitiakitanga, guardianship, and evoked powerful atua wāhine to protect them. The painting also raises concerns for Māori heritage protection policies, whereby inconsistences in practice may paradoxically facilitate cultural
site destruction.

The rhythmic surface patterning in the folds of Ropata-Tangahoe’s dress further grounds her connections to ngā atua wāhine, tūpuna (ancestors) and whenua (lands). In presenting herself in this embodied way, she farewells her ancestors once more.

Huhana Smith