Matawhenua -
nā Kezia Whakamoe
March 2022
Our tūpuna used whenua as personal adornment. Colours from the earth were crushed and mixed with water, animal oil and plant extracts to decorate their faces, hair and bodies.
Whenua adornments were used for lots of reasons. Sometimes these adornments were practical as protection from the elements (or sandflies). Sometimes these eye-catching aesthetic choices would have made the wearer standout or fit in. Sometimes adornment was used to mark a significant occasion or person. Whatever the case, the ancestors would have looked striking, colourful, bold and importantly of the whenua.
To help extend our understanding of this practice, Kauae Raro commissioned Ngāi Tūhoe, Ngāti Ruapani artist Kezia Whakamoe to produce a new series exploring Matawhenua. The following images and whakaaro are from Kezia herself. We hope this artist’s inspiring mahi gets other tāngata whenua using these beautiful, colourful materials in expressive ways.
‘Kurungaituku’, Kezia Whakamoe, 2022
MATAWHENUA WHAKATAU
When I wear LANDBACK on my face
I turn at Pōhutukawa and jump back on land up here the stars shine reddish brown sound like bark stretching covering my eyes, I can see
I feel big
big feelings flow
“80’s”, Kezia Whakamoe, 2022
everything NOT whenua clears
I am alone now
AND I am with them
gathering breath quickens hearts pump harakeke rustles, whenua stomped, tended, whānau grown
they leave now
like a breath out
on the next tide
‘Kuhuroa’, Kezia Whakamoe, 2022
this whenua is a medium, a tūāhu, I feel powerful there is a crack in the land
a gaping wound
I pack it with whenua, stitch it with water build a road,
a map, calling in
a bridge home
no long dark lashes on the back of this face!
this whenua facilitates expansion
“Ceremonial”, Kezia Whakamoe, 2022
I see through the body of Papa, breathe in her native spaces your body nourishes me, Kaitangata and mine is yours what silica magic, what iron gold, what pale bone shield what dark ferment and rich soil streams down my cheeks? my loves, my loved, i grow with us