He kōrero | Ringa toi
Ngaio Cowell
He kōrero | Ringa toi
Ngaio Cowell
Photography by Naomi Haussmann
Styling and interview by Erin Broughton
Modeled by Ngaio Cowell
Ngaio Cowell (Ngaati Te Ata Waiohua, Waikato Tainui, Ngāti Porou) is a self-described haututū and ringatoi based in Ōhinehau-Lyttelton. Primarily working within the realm of Te Whare Pora-the House of Weaving, she likes to work with te taiao in mind, primarily using natural dyes and resources, but more recently has moved into the public arts, designing large-scale weaving-inspired paving for her iwi in Taamaki-Makaurau.
Ngaio is one of the Kaiwhakahaere at Te Whare Tapere in Te Matatiki Toi Ora the Arts Centre, a dedicated Māori Arts Space, celebrating Ngā Toi Māori in all forms.
We caught up with Ngaio to chat about her mahi with Te Whare Tapere, The Art Centre and Eat New Zealand; all centred on celebrations for Matariki this year — Ngaio has been busy; she’s involved in Feast Matariki: Kai Hau Kau - Imagining Abundance, Tīrama Mai where she’s also exhibiting a public work Engari te Ngari Ngari. She’s an artist liaison, a weaver, a painter, a designer, and a manager and curator of an art space among many other things. When we visited Ngaio at The Arts Centre we stopped in at Te Whare Tapere, The Observatory Hotel, The Great Hall, Tīrama Mai (bringing the light) and the installation for Feast Matariki.
▲ Ngaio Wears Daylight Moon Walk In The Light Dress - Grey and whatu kākahu
As Kairanga, we make nets for ika… Create the hīnaki for tuna. Make the cordage for kererū snares. Weave the waikawa for rīwai and kūmara.
INF: Can you talk me through the process of making your work for Haaraki?
Ngaio: The work was created with another artist Alix Ashworth and is a part of Feast Matariki — So a few years ago for Matariki, it started getting really busy for us in the arts, and we were always asked to do the token art thing. For me, Matariki has always been about food and I was having to choose between my food sovereignty passion and arts at that time of year and I always found it quite hard.
I work with Eat New Zealand and they do an event every year called Feast Matariki, I wanted to do it at the Art Centre, because why not — so what we have is the art piece which is a traditional food stage, or a depiction of a traditional food stage. At Matariki, you would have a Hautapu in the morning when you could see the stars, and you’d have a hāngi and the steam would feed the stars. So you cook and eat kai based on the thought behind all the different whetu/ stars; so there’s food from the earth, food from the sky (which would have been birds like kēreu, but now would be chicken) and then freshwater fish like tuna, kai moana.. You’d mix it all up with something from each star and use the steam from the hangi to feed them. So the work is called Engari te Ngari Ngari which is a collaboration in the naming between Kommi and I.
Each year Feast Matariki has a theme, last year it was Mahinga Kai- bringing people together, but this year it’s Kai Hau Kai — which is a Kāi Tahu food-sharing practice, and we’re talking about food sovereignty as well... Wanted to comment on the fact that there isn’t actually food sovereignty. All the food we eat isn’t from our realm — we should be able to get it from within this takiwā but we can’t. The name that Kommi and I came up with is from a whakataukī which is about there being less, and so when we did the description we made it about the idea that if we work together we will be able to feed each other again.
▲ Engari te Ngari Ngari, Ngaio Cowell and Alix Ashworth, 2024
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▲ Engari te Ngari Ngari, Ngaio Cowell and Alix Ashworth, 2024
Ngaio Wears: Paloma Wool Voyage - Navy Print, YMC Jackie Gilet - Multi, Marle Hayden Top - Ivory, YMC Peggy Trouser - Navy / Ecru
INF: You’re in so many different spaces at the moment, you have Feast and Te Whare Tapare, which is where you’ve worked for a while — and they're centralised in The Arts Centre, but can you talk about how they’re connected or separate?
Ngaio: I’ve worked at Te Whare Tapare for about a year which came about from the Māori advisory committee, and when they came on board they were promised a dedicated Māori art space and then Juanita and I came on board — she comes from a performance background and I come from a visual arts background so it means we can do all of the things. We have full autonomy of the space and we’ve done some really cool stuff, it’s only been a year. The space is really about the community. It has become a hub for Māori Artists to gather. I first connected with the arts centre through Rekindle where I used to teach Raranga (weaving).
INF: We just visited the Observatory which has an exhibition running Te Waiatatanga Mai o te Atua The Song of the Gods, [which is Te Matatiki Toi Ora The Arts Centre’s brand-new permanent group exhibition with works from Dr Areta Wilkinson (Ngāi Tahu), Turumeke Harrington (Kāi Tahu, Rangitāne), Alex McLeod (Ngāi Tahu, Te Rarawa, Ngāti Rangi, Tainui, Ngāti Porou). Kate Stevens West (Ngāi Tahu), Christine Harvey (Ngāi Tahu, Kāti Mamoe, Moriori, Ngāti Mutunga, Te Ati Awa, Ngāti Toa Rangatira) and Ariana Tikao (Kāi Tahu). The exhibition tells a version of the Ngāi Tahu creation story, as written down in 1849 by Matiaha Tiramōrehu.]
We also went into the Great Hall where there will be a performance by Kommi Me Ana Taipō. [Kommi (Kāi Tahu, Te-Āti-Awa) is a Lyttelton-based vocalist, who performs entirely in the Kāi Tahu dialect, they are also a writer, poet, activist and a lecturer in Māori and Indigenous Studies and Te Reo Māori. They performed as part of last year's sell-out Matariki performance ‘Ka Noho, Ka Mate’ in the Great Hall.]
Both this exhibition and the performance sit slightly outside your capacity as curator and manager of Te Whare Tapere, but can you touch on your involvement with those?
Ngaio: I’m more like an artist liaison with Māori artists, so technically our title is Māori Programme Coordinators and so we link in through our networks… so Kommi for example asked me if it was a good idea for them to do it, so I was part of the negotiation and explaining how it works, but that’s part of the actual Art Centre… That's the same with the observatory tower one, I could assist with the Arts Centre team, while Areta Wilkinson curated the show. So I was working with the team to ensure the artists were being looked after because we want all of our events to be tika within the greater Arts Centre.
INF: Big Job!
Ngaio: That’s why it’s good there are two of us — Juanita is Kāi Tahu as well, which is essential. We do it so that our people have an awesome space to be around and create toi.
Te Whare Tapare is really about the community. It has become a hub for Māori Artists to gather...We do it so that our people have an awesome space to be around and create toi.
▲ Ngaio Wears: A.P.C Mac Faustine - Dark Navy
▲ Ngaio Wears: A.P.C Mac Faustine - Dark Navy and Paloma Wool Voyage - Navy Print
INF: Do you have an ideal projection of how Matariki celebrations would work — what’s the dream?
Ngaio: They’ve been hosting Matariki Festivals here for about five years now and this is one of the best that I’ve seen, it’s tricky because we should be resting and I tried to get it all done before the actual Matariki, so I think if all the mahi finished before the holiday so then everyone can just do what they want.
INF: I wanted to ask about the exhibition that’s currently on at Te Whare Tapare, In the middle cabinet there are these industrial-looking combs… are they shearing combs??
Ngaio: Yeah, they are they’re used to size the harakeke. That’s actually what we have as our exhibition image... One of the things that led to that exhibition that I think is quite cool is that all of our tools are repurposed anyway, so it’s cool to have the whakapapa of that. So that big shreddy thing is a floristry frog, but it’s great for stripping Harakeke. It’s such a good name because they sit at the bottom of a vase. My teacher had one that you could clamp to the bottom of the table — clever. The Taa moko cabinet is also awesome. Naith from Absolution lent us all of the tattoo equipment that’s in the taa moko cabinets. There is a traditional bone uhi and a modern needle with the same size teeth!
INF: And you have woven work in the exhibition as well...
Ngaio: Yeah, they’re just my little… plays? The basket one on the windowsill is my favourite type of weave it’s a kupenga weave which is a fishing net. But I like it because it looks like a mushroom or basket fungus. It had a plant in it and the idea was that you could put your wishes…Hiwa i te Rangi… wishes for the future into it…. and Pohutakawa which was notes for those who had passed. And they were going to burn all the notes and plant the trees.
Any other projects that you’re working on or have on the horizon?
Ngaio: Our Iwi Ngaati Te Ata Waiohuu, which is South Auckland — so kind of like Manakau, Māngere, that area. A couple of my family members and I are doing cultural narrative designs for large-scale areas, so three train stations and a park — so for all of them I’ve done woven patterns out of bricks. A bit like the whāriki around the city by Aunty Do and Nanny Mū but using normal-sized bricks so they’re this large scale but look like a whāriki entry mat. Which is super fun and then in Manukau they’re restoring a park and making half of it back into a wetland, so we’re doing all of the paving around there and sculpture and art pieces. Again it’s a fabrication so it's hands-off. We’re working with Isthmus on one project and they’re really good — they’ve made a spreadsheet for me on all the different ceramic and concrete bricks with a carbon score. I would like to use clay bricks but if it’s someone else's whenua I don’t know if I want to do that, and in terms of durability and ease of doing what I actually want to do… it’s interesting.
INF: I wanted to ask you and maybe this is more of a comment… but we have such a Western prescription of design in New Zealand, especially in teaching (Graphic Design) it tends to come from a Western perspective, but we’re in a place that has this huge visual culture of communication — and I’ve often heard comments like.. Where are the Māori women designers??… but it’s like… they’re not necessarily in Western design circles. And maybe it feels like product design... Like the design, thinking doesn't correlate with ideas of graphic design like ‘swiss’ etc and that means that there are so many visual communications that we don’t credit as being graphic or visual design in that way… often the application is through public artwork.
Ngaio: Yeah, it is interesting, I’m currently doing my masters in Māori and Indigenous leadership and it’s Wānanga style so it’s a Māori way of learning, but my thesis statement is about decolonizing art which was originally supposed to be centred on art gallery spaces and how people are treated differently, but now it’s shifted to include design and sovereignty over patterns and toi in general as well. If you’re giving things over to the public realm it might get defaced and people walk over it and you have to distance yourself in a way from it to be comfortable to work in that realm. In my class, there are 70 people and 10 of those are men. There’s this thing, where what me and Juanita do, and a lot of wāhine designers kind of do a bit of everything because they don’t want to conform as one thing. I describe myself as a haututū which is someone who plays, a bit of a dabbler and a little bit cheeky. I am a weaver but I’m also a painter and a designer and a manager and curator of an arts space, kind of like my fingers are in all the pies. I think a lot of us end up doing what we want to do.