
Art I’m Into: Nina Tonga, Curator Pacific Art
“When installed and backlit, the work casts thousands of shadows that envelop the viewer.”
Free museum entry for New Zealanders and people living in New Zealand
Open every day 10am-6pm
(except Christmas Day)
Free museum entry for New Zealanders and people living in New Zealand
Pacific Sisters: Fashion Activists is a celebration of mana wāhine, indigenous identities, and the role this collective has played over the past 26 years – through their collaborative works across fashion, performance, music, and film – in giving voice and visibility to Māori and Pacific peoples in Aotearoa New Zealand.
17 Mar – 15 Jul 2018
Toi Art, Level 4
Free entry
All ages
The Pacific Sisters is a collective of Pacific and Māori fashion designers, artists, performers, and musicians that electrified 1990s Auckland.
The group began on the fringes, but their ground-breaking style and performances brought the urban lives of a New Zealand–born Pacific generation into the mainstream spotlight.
The Pacific Sisters include ground-breaking artists Lisa Reihana, Rosanna Raymond, Ani O’Neill, Suzanne Tamaki, Selina Haami, Niwhai Tupaea, Henzart @ Henry Ah-Foo Taripo, Feeonaa Wall, and Jaunnie ‘Ilolahia.
They once described themselves as being like the Polynesian version of Andy Warhol’s factory – an ever-evolving collective of artists coming together to create art, music, fashion, and film.
“Our work is a reflection of the ‘spark’ we have had as Pacific Sisters – finding our connections to our Pacific stories, peoples, lands, each other,” Ani O’Neill says.
“For me, Pacific Sisters is a safe space to push boundaries. We might seem a bit hardcore and serious to some, but we have a lot of fun – we like to laugh and play with words as well as frocks.”
This is their first major retrospective.
This exhibition also toured to Auckland Art Gallery, 23 Feb — 14 Jul 2019.
“When installed and backlit, the work casts thousands of shadows that envelop the viewer.”
An exploration of colour, shape, and pattern in the Pacific.
Closed
17 Mar 2018 – 2 Apr 2023
Exhibition Ngā whakaaturanga
“When I first unpacked this work from its travelling crate an uncontrollable shiver went up my spine.”
From Te Papa’s art collection comes a dynamic exhibition across five galleries. The art works here explore identity and cross-cultural exchange.
Closed
17 Mar 2018 – 13 Sep 2021
Exhibition Ngā whakaaturanga
Whimsical but with a critical edge, ‘Détour’ is Michael Parekowhai’s response to the repositioning of contemporary art at Te Papa with the opening of the new gallery.
Closed
17 Mar – 8 Nov 2018
Exhibition Ngā whakaaturanga
One hundred of the best-loved works in the national art collection at Te Papa
The 30-year evolution of world-renowned New Zealand jeweller Lisa Walker.
Closed
17 Mar – 22 Jul 2018
Exhibition Ngā whakaaturanga