Back in print!
De retour dans les médias !

Hiatus

I am on maternity leave, but I was able to get a few blurbs out before the baby arrived…

Je suis en congé maternité. Voici quelques textes publiés avant l’accouchement…

Recent encounters / De belles rencontres

Two more profiles for Volunteer Wellington. It is each time the opportunity for me to meet with fascinating characters and dip into a person’s life story without feeling voyeuristic. A treat!

Voici deux nouveaux portraits rédigés pour le compte de Volunteer Wellington. A chaque fois, c’est l’occasion pour moi de me plonger dans des trajectoires de vie atypiques et de rassasier ma curiosité sans verser dans l’indiscrétion.

Tattoo, beauty and ferocity

One of the most striking Māori visual arts is tattooing. Monochromatic, magnetic and graphic, tā moko is mesmerizing. When worn by kapa haka performers, it enhances their facial expressions. And in everyday life, it speaks to the pride one takes in one’s tribal identity. Traditional tā moko designs refer to whakapapa or lineage which can usually be traced all the way back to the ancestors who first settled in Aotearoa New Zealand.

Mark Kopua, a revered tohunga tā moko (expert in tā moko) who hails from Tolaga Bay, recently opened a studio in Titahi Bay, just up the coast from Wellington. I met his 26-year old female apprentice, Taryn Beri, for a chat.

The practice of tā moko nearly died out in the 20^th century as tattoos were frowned upon by pākehā. Only a few women continued to wear the “kauae” on the chin. In the early 70s, Michael King, a scholar who wrote a book on Māori tattoo which may have helped to revive the practice, was able to find only 71 women with a chin tattoo during his research.

Nowadays, though, “a lot of women wear the kauae, says Taryn Beri. In their everyday life, being teachers, nurses, and lawyers… Particularly on the East Coast. It’s a lot more common there. If you go to the supermarket, you’re bound to cross at least one woman with a kaue. Part of that strength is what we’re trying to bring here, in this urban environment.” With the opening of Moko Ake studio in the Wellington region, “urban Māori have access to quality tā moko, an expression of where they come from.” Taryn, who doesn’t wear the kauae herself, wishes it to be considered as “normal”. Her mentor has a full facial tattoo, a rangi pāruhi.

She met Mark Kopua five years ago at the first Māori Market in Wellington. He was accompanied by his female apprentice: “I was intrigued because that was the first woman that I had seen doing tā moko”. They are now just over a handful in the country according to Taryn. Since she was herself passionate about tattooing, “Uncle Mark” gave her the advice to quit her job and move to Gisborne to attend Toihoukura, the School of Maori Visual Art & Design. After a year of studying, Uncle Mark called her and asked her to trial with him for two weeks in Tolaga Bay. “I’ve been with him ever since.”

Training entails a lot of observation, respecting the safety and hygiene requirements, drawing, but also learning the karakia (prayers) and waiata (chants) which are part of the ritual of tā moko.

The custom of carving the skin is shared in the South Pacific with Samoa, Tahiti and the Marquesas.

C’est presque un cliché : pour beaucoup, l’évocation de la culture māorie convoque à l’esprit l’image de tatouages à l’encre noire, élégamment graphiques, pointus et courbes à la fois, s’étalant sur le corps et le visage d’un indigène. Tā moko, c’est ainsi qu’on le nomme ici, est bien l’un des traits distinctifs de la civilisation précoloniale en Aotearoa Nouvelle-Zélande. Et dire que ce mode d’expression a failli périr avec le règne colonial, les Pākehā (Blancs) voyant ces parures, belles et féroces, d’un mauvais œil…

Au début des années 70, aucun homme n’en était paré et seules 71 femmes portaient les lèvres et le menton ornés du « te kauae ».

Aujourd’hui, tā moko, de nouveau répandu, a retrouvé sa force symbolique. Pour les Māoris, il est signe de fierté identitaire et d’appartenance à un clan : on peut y lire le whakapapa, la lignée, du sujet dans les volutes gravées dans la peau. Une sorte de mémento, donc.

Mark Kopua et son apprentie Taryn Beri viennent d’ouvrir un studio de tatouage à Titahi Bay, juste au Nord de Wellington. Je me suis rendue à son inauguration et ai eu le loisir de papoter avec Taryn, wahine tohunga tā moko (experte en tā moko) de 26 ans.

Leur ambition est de populariser tā moko en milieu urbain. Sur la côte Est, les tatouages sont si répandus qu’ils ne détonnent plus. « Au supermarché, on croise forcément au moins une femme portant te kauae », assure Taryn. Ce n’est pas encore le cas à Wellington. Et rares sont encore les hommes qui arborent le moko facial complet tel Mark Kopua...

Lost in Translation ?

L’exposition E Tū Ake—Standing Strong qui vient de se clore au musée Te Papa de Wellington va voyager en France à l’automne. Elle sera inaugurée au Quai Branly sous le titre « Maori—leurs trésors ont une âme ».

Je ne sais pas si j’aurai l’occasion de voir la version française de cette exposition mais je brûle de pouvoir comparer leurs mises en scène et leurs discours.

D’emblée, rien qu’en disposant des titres choisis, j’en déduis que l’accent n’est pas porté au même endroit. Le titre néo-zélandais a une résonnance politique. Il s’apparente à un slogan et évoque la résistance des Māori face à la menace d’acculturation et d’anéantissement de leur identité dans leur propre pays. Le titre français, lui, ne retient pas cet aspect revendicatif. Il est consensuel et résolument classique. Il semble annoncer une banale rétrospective : ce sont les œuvres du passé qui sont mises à l’honneur. Rien dans la formulation ne laisse soupçonner que le propos est un dialogue entre les témoignages du passé et les pratiques contemporaines, si ce n’est l’usage du présent de l’indicatif.

C’est dommage car ce qui fait le sel d’E Tū Ake, c’est justement cet ancrage dans l’actualité, et notamment l’actualité politique.

Le parcours s’ouvrait sur un exposé théorique du concept de tino rangatiratanga. Ce terme māori exprime la capacité à choisir sa destinée et se traduit, au choix, par souveraineté, autorité ou autodétermination. Il renvoie à l’affirmation et la fierté de l’identité māori qui se cultive, dans le domaine des arts, en conservant, ravivant ou réinterprétant des techniques du passé. Au fil de l’exposition, l’on découvre ainsi des ouvrages de vannerie et de tissage récents qui intègrent des matériaux modernes tout en rendant hommage aux œuvres ancestrales. Une salle est consacrée à la renaissance du Ta moko, l’art du tatouage, et à la redécouverte des instruments de musique traditionnels.

Mais là où le propos de l’expo est particulièrement habile, c’est qu’il ne se cantonne pas au champ artistique. Il est élargi au domaine politique et englobe les luttes menées par les Māori depuis les années 70 pour faire respecter leurs droits (la Marche de 1975 sur Wellington pour mettre fin aux expropriations des terres, l’occupation de Bastion Point en 1977-78, la conception d’un drapeau māori en 1990 et la polémique actuelle sur le littoral). Sur le plan territorial, tino rangatiratanga se traduit par l’aspiration des Māori à recouvrer leurs terres et les ressources naturelles qui en découlent afin de les gérer comme ils l’entendent, un droit qui est inscrit dans le Traité de Waitangi, acte fondateur de la Nouvelle-Zélande. Inutile de préciser que cet aspect-là, à la différence de la renaissance inoffensive des arts et des artisanats, est sujet à controverse dans l’opinion publique. C’est donc un choix audacieux de la part d’une institution publique que de se mouiller ainsi. J’admire cet aplomb du Te Papa et j’espère que l’adaptation du Quai Branly ne sera pas édulcorée.

The “E Tū Ake—Standing Strong” exhibition that just shut down at the Te Papa Museum in Wellington is due to move to Paris in the fall. It will be shown at the Quai Branly Museum, which harbors collections of African, Asian, American and Oceanian Art.

I don’t know if I’ll get the chance to visit it, but I wish I do because the comparison between the NZ and the French versions will surely be telling. By merely looking at the titles chosen—“E Tū Ake—Standing Strong” becomes “The Māori—their Treasures Have a Soul” in French—it’s apparent to me that the emphasis will be laid differently in the French exhibition from what I’ve seen here. Whereas the Wellington show clearly linked arts, identity, and politics, such a stance is not discernable in the French title which sounds rather consensual.

It’s too bad because, to me, what made “E Tū Ake” trenchant and thought-provoking was precisely the way it showed how culture merged into politics and one went hand-in-hand with the other. “The Taonga in this exhibition express not only histories, identities, and world view of Māori, but also the political aspiration of this strong and resilient culture.” Therefore, to illustrate the Māori renaissance, the exhibition not only included contemporary works of weaving, ta moko, or engraving in conversation with ancestral pieces, but also detailed the struggles from the past forty years to reclaim Māori rights (the 1975 Land March, the 1977-78 Occupation of Bastion Point, the design of the Māori flag in 1990, and the current controversy on the Foreshore and Seabed Act).

I do hope the French version of the exhibition does not water down this discourse.

Volunteer Wellington Update

Deux autres portraits / Two more profiles

100 / Rugby is not just a sport

[Note: this post is so long that I’ve broken it in 2. Here is the English version. French version below.]

The countdown to the Rugby World Cup (RWC) started on June 1^st, with one hundred days to go. I suppose rugby fans are genuinely excited about the sport’s side of things, but all you can hear or read in the media revolves around business opportunities. Will those tickets finally sell? How to cash in on the World Cup? Will benefits outweigh costs? So this is what it’s really about…

In a nutshell: the RWC will run for 45 days (six weeks!) from September 9 until October 23. 19 teams will be competing in 48 games. NZ is expecting 85,000 visitors (2,000 journalists), and 5,000 volunteers are involved. All in all, it is branded as THE LARGEST EVENT EVER HOSTED in the country.

The overarching marketing scheme is to raise New Zealand’s profile on the world scene. What this means I’m not quite sure (can the parks sustain more tourists?). And I find it unfortunate that in all those discussions, there’s an undertone of insecurity. It is constantly implied that the country needs to prove or achieve a world-class status, a rather disputable goal. But more on that later…

The hundred in the title actually does not only refer to the RWC. I’m seizing this opportunity to touch upon an old news item—2010’s celebration of the New Zealand Māori team centenary. I suspect few people outside New Zealand are aware that, along the All Blacks, coexists a national Māori rugby team (which used to be named the Māori All Blacks). I was intrigued enough to seek more information on this, and spoke to Malcolm Mulholland, a Massey University academic, the author of Beneath the Māori Moon—An Illustrated History of Māori Rugby. Here’s an edited version of our conversation.

Cécile Lepage: What was the genesis of this book?

Malcolm Mulholland: In 2001, I had started writing a column on Māori issues in the Hawke’s Bay Today, and it came to the attention of Huia Publishers who asked me if I would like to write the history of Māori rugby. Like most New Zealanders, I grew up in a rugby household. Ever since the age of 7, I’ve played rugby. I was crap, but that’s what every male kid in this country does. It’s part of our make-up. I said “yes, let’s do it”.

CL: Did you have any preconceived idea on the topic before starting this book?

MM: The only preconceived idea I had was how proud our people are of Māori rugby. It came to prominence in the last 15 years, especially under the coaching of Matt Te Pou. The Māori team was dominant during his era. He revitalized the public consciousness of this team. Prior to this, there were only two books written about Māori rugby. One was called Māori Rugby, and it was just a statistical account. So they had every game by year, who played, how many points, and that was it. And following the tour to Wales in 1982, Bob Howitt and Winston McCarthy put out a book called Haka—The Māori Rugby Story. It wasn’t a bad book, but it was very anecdotal, and it was written from a Pakeha perspective. So there were parts that I found, in today’s context, patronizing. They had a thing for example for what they called the “Māori sidestep” which was when you ran straight into a player. There’s a bit of an undertone here, a generalization to say that every Māori player tries to run through a person. So I was just really keen to get a comprehensive history of Māori rugby from a Māori perspective.

CL: Can you talk about what you uncovered?

MM: Probably the one that sticks out is the Apartheid issue. Everyone was aware that it happened, but nobody had actually gone through and chronicled the NZRU’s role, South African government’s and RU’s role and our own government’s role in that chapter. So the first time Apartheid emerges is post World War I. There was an All Black named Rangi Wilson, a West Indian, playing for the New Zealand Forces team. They berthed in Durban, and it was made very clear that he should remain on the boat because of his skin colour. It began there. Then in 1921 the South Africans toured in New Zealand. They played the NZ Māori in Napier. Prior to the game, when the Springboks marched on the field, the Māori team did a haka, and the Springboks players turned their back on them. The Māori team lost, and there was controversy on the field. In a review, a journo said it was disgusting watching a New Zealand public cheering a Māori side. That racist slur set the tone for the next 60 years! In 1928, the All Blacks were to reciprocate that particular tour, and it was made clear that Māori players would not be welcome in South Africa. The trade off was that the Māori team would go to France. It was a way of pacifying Māori protest. It was basically buying them!

CL: So that’s one explanation of the existence of a separate Māori team…

MM: Yes, that was one of the rationales, but the idea was also to have a team the Māori could be proud of, as a pathway of development for Māori players because they were flocking in droves. And the main reason actually was to defeat them from going to League, and changing codes.

CL: So Māori players were banned from touring in South Africa. The NZRU abides by this request. And there were no protest against this decision.

MM: The turning point is 1959. This is when people started marching the streets, really taking a stand. That was led by an Irish Wellington surgeon, Rolland O’Regan, who married a Māori woman. He led a delegation, the Citizens All Black Tour Association, to meet with the Prime Minister and ask him to intervene and stop the Māori discrimination. But those pleas were ignored.

CL: And the tensions escalate until 1981, when the Springboks come to New Zealand. You quote a photographer saying that “it was the closest this country ever came to civil war”.

MM: Yes, 1981 brings everything to a head. There were mass riots. People were lucky not to be killed. The irony of this was that the Minister of Police and Māori Affairs at the time was Ben Couch, who was not allowed to tour in 49 as a player. And here he was upholding the Muldoon line: “Politics shouldn’t’ mix with sport”. The aftermath of the 81 Tour was that it all came at such a cost to the country that we never allowed another Apartheid team to tour our country.

CL: You actually played a role in the resolution of this conflict.

MM: The one comment that stayed with me was from Patricia Mill, the daughter of Jimmy Mill, a player who was denied to go in 28. She said: “To the day my father died, it always used to wrinkle with him the fact that his own country denied his right to be who he was as a person. He blasted the NZRU for being complacent with the discrimination.” I mentioned that to a New Zealand Herald reporter, and I reflected that something needed to happen in order to resolve that sad part of history. I suggested retrospective test caps, recognizing that those guys should have been selected and acknowledging them in that way. That sparked a public debate. The consensus was that an apology should be issued, which the NZRU eventually did do. There’s still a feeling in the Māori community that that apology needs to be issued face to face in a hui [a meeting]. I know that Oregan Hoskins, the South African Rugby boss, is very keen to meet with Māori when he comes over for the World Cup. And also, the survivors of the 81 Springboks team are talking about organizing a tour to come here. So we’ll try to organize something around that. The one major player who hasn’t yet apologized is our government.