Ratene Hihitaua

This studio portrait of Ratene Hihitawa of Ngati Paoa (Hauraki) is both artisticly delightful and culturally important.

The portrait itself is unusual for the period and has an artistic quality, although this may be unintentional as most photographic studios produced carte-de-visites to meet European curiosity for exotic ethnographic types as a source of commercial revenue. Regardless, the oblique perspective and the soft edges highlight Ratene's lined and aged face, and delicately delineate the expertly incised moko (face tattoo). And the work is clearly that of a superior tohunga-ta-moko (expert tattooist).

The Bohemian artist Gottfried Lindauer probably used this photographic study as the basis for his 1897 portrait of Ratene, which is a part of the Auckland Art Gallery's Partidge collection of Lindauer paintings.

The complete nature of his moko, it's superior execution, and the fact that the forehead area is completely infilled, are all indicators of Ratene's mana (prestige and authority) and noble birth. Ratene is wearing European clothing, which was widely adopted during the post-Treaty early colonial period, and still wears a motoi taringa (small nephrite ear pendant) in his ear.