māuiui whakatiki - eating disorder

*desparately swallows without chewing, feverishly placating the irreconcilable void. Eyes vacant.

You can see my rib bones, you can see my backbone but I can’t. Im obsessed with food but I won’t eat it. How can you live on the souls of baby birds? they make you fat! Sometimes I eat ten at a time but I throw them up so it’s ok.

Paihamu ki Heretaunga rib bones.

Circumference = 40 cm. $175

whaiarorua - bipolar

Often in a manic state, they talk so much they don’t realise they are bleeding out. And they don’t care.

Until all the care floods in and drowns them.

I am the scapegoat of every crazy artist joke but I can time travel, my pain is actually yours. My ancestors inhabit my body, I am the wind for a whole month; I am sometimes the molten iron core of the earth. I have no edges, I have no mouth. I can’t go to work today.

Paihamu ki Heretaunga, scapula.

Circumference 62 cm. $175

mate wareware - dementia

I forgot how I connect .. who am I? I am lurching in space for a memory of .. anything .. I am lost

My spine is disconnected, I can’t live in my body. I know that I love you, I just don’t know how. I can’t remember what I can remember. What is this machine? I try to speak but woouorfnkd,x

Paihamu ki Heretaunga, spine.

Circumference = 42 cm. $150

aukati

I am the storm and the eye of the storm

AUKATI was my intervention into rape culture. I had been sexually violated since I was 13. This caused sexual addiction and a deep illness in the way I related to my body.

“Whiteness and white racialized identity refer to the way that white people, their customs, culture, and beliefs operate as the standard by which all other groups of are compared.” Whiteness

Self portrait, 2021. before AUKATI, Heretaunga

what is mahi toi?

I’ve heard many people say “I’m not an artist, I cant even draw a stick figure”. The underlying belief is that art is about rendering a realistic figure or copying something. How did this happen??!!! (drawing nudes from the male gaze)

Firstly ZERO artists I know draw stick figures. Art is about creative thinking, creative problem solving, transformative interventions. It is the very opposite of stick figures.

Secondly, art is not the same as mahi Toi.

mahi TOI is the visual manifestation of Mātauranga Māori

TOI tū te mauri TOI tū te mana TOI tū te whenua TOI tū te tangata

TOI is endurance

WHAT IS MĀTAURANGA MĀORI ENDURING?

extinction. genocide. what else is enduring extinction and genocide?

Life as we know it. PAPATŪĀNUKU.

Mahi Toi uplifts the very thing that gives us life - it’s not a personal emotional catharsis or reaction, though it often starts there. It is a process; mahi Toi carries a responsibility. Are we contributing to consumerism and extraction of resources? Are we using materials that harm the earth just because they look good? Are we aware of the carbon footprint of the block chain? Are we selling stuff to buy more stuff? Are we projecting a narrative of stuck rage or victimhood? If we practice mahi Toi, we have a collective responsibility.