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Join artists Dr Rachael Hall, Pā’utu-’O-Vava’u-Lahi Dr Adriana Māhanga Lear & Dr Sione Faletau for a special walk-through of their exhibition. This public programme includes a panel Q&A, with Te Papa, Curator of Pacific Cultures, Dr Emelihter Kihleng, and Mama Karatia Grace Hutton QSM, Kaitiaki Taonga, with Jacki Leota-Mua, Pātaka's Curator Māori Moana. Live performances and activations follow, centered on the fangufangu (bamboo nose flute), offering insight into ancient Tongan musical traditions and their contemporary resonances. Experience how classical music, design, digital media, and indigenous Tongan knowledge converge to create powerful expressions of identity shaped by ancestral sound.
Free Event. All welcome.
ARTIST BIOS
DR RACHAEL HALL is a designer, artist, researcher and lecturer based in Te Whanganui a Tāra. With ancestral ties to Niutoua, Tongatapu and Ta’anea, Vava’u, her work contributes to preserving customary Tongan artforms while opening new pathways for evolution. Designing and handcrafting reproduced and re-imagined instruments, she weaves notions of past, present and future, inviting musicians to explore new possibilities in sound, musical expression, and cultural identity. Rachael holds a PhD in Industrial Design from Massey University.
PĀ'UTU-'O'VAVA'U-LAHI DR ADRIANA MĀHANGA LEAR is a queer Tongan-Australian interdisciplinary artist and researcher working across sound, music, photography, print, video, sculpture and installation. Adriana holds ancestral ties to Tu’anuku, Vava’u and Vaipoa, Niuatoputapu. Central to Adriana’s practice is an embodied ‘re-sounding’ of the archive and visual and sonic application of kupesi as motif, symbolism and language. Adriana has a PhD in Creative Arts from the University of Wollongong.
DR SIONE FALETAU is a multidisciplinary artist and researcher of Tongan descent, based in Ōtara, South Auckland, with ancestral ties to Taunga and Lakepa. Working with sound design, sculptural projection mapping and digital media, he transforms audio frequencies into visual forms, reenergising kupesi (Tongan patterns) as living, dynamic expressions of identity. Sione’s Master's and Doctor of Fine Arts is from the Elam School of Fine Arts, University of Auckland.
TE PAPA BIOS
DR EMELIHTER KIHLENG is a poet, curator, and teacher. She works as Curator Pacific Cultures at Te Papa Tongarewa. Emeli was born on Guam/Guåhan and raised on her father's island of Pohnpei in the Federated States of Micronesia and in Honolulu, Hawai'i.
MAMA KARATIA GRACE HUTTON QSM is from Manihiki, Palmerston atoll, Penrhyn in the Cook Islands, and Anaa in the Tuamotus. She has worked at Te Papa since 2004 as the Mana Tiaki/Kaitiaki Taonga of the Pacific Cultures collections.
PĀTAKA BIO
JACKI LEOTA-MUA is an Aotearoa-born Samoan (Salamumu Upolu, Avao Savai'i) of mixed heritage. She will be facilitating the panel talanoa as Curator Māori Moana at Pātaka, a role she has held for over three years. Jacki previously lived and work in the Pacific for 15 years, collaborating with artists, activists, regional agencies and civil society organizations on many projects, in Fiji and Papua New Guinea.
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Event Venue
17 Parumoana Street, Porirua, New Zealand 5022, New Zealand
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