Portrait of a life cast of Matoua Tawai, Aotearoa New Zealand

Portrait of a life cast of Matoua Tawai, Aotearoa New Zealand

Nō te tau 2001 a Fiona Pardington e kapo ana i ngā taonga i ngā whare pupuru taonga. Ka whakaaturia ngā whakaahua o ngā tinana hangarewa kōaro i pokepoke a e Pierre-Marie Alexandra Dumoutier hei whakaahua i ngā iwi o Te Moana-Nui-a-Kiwa i te rautau tekau mā iwa, i tāna terenga e kīia ana ko The Ahua: A beautiful hesitation. He mātanga tinana, he mātanga hangarewa kōaro hoki a Dumoutier, ā, i whai wāhi ia i te terenga ki te tuakoi tonga o te ao, a Jules Sébastien César Dumont d’Urville, i te tau 1837 ki te tau 1841. I taua wā i whai wāhi ngā hangarewa kōaro i ngā tikanga pūtaiao rūpahu e pā ana ki te roro, ināianei kua whakakahoretia, ki te whakamārama i te āhua me te koi o te tangata. Neke atu i te 50 hangarewa kōaro i hangaia mō te terenga nui, ā, i kawea ki ngā kohikohinga o Ūropi.

I kapohia tēnei tauira e kīia nei ko te Portrait of a life cast of Matoua Tawai, i Musee de l’Homme, i Parī, arā, e whakaahua ana i ngā āhuatanga hanihani a te Pākehā i ngā iwi o Te Moana-Nui-a-Kiwa. He waiaro ōrite e puta tonu ana i runga i te ngaro o ngā tuhinga o te rautau tekau mā iwa e pā ana ki ngā hangarewa kōaro, e whakarangirua ana i te tika o te kōrero e hāngai ana ki Matoua Tawai. Ka whakamānawatia te tupuna Māori, ā, ka whakatairangitia te āhua o te tāne i tōna tānga moko, arā, ka huraina hoki ngā puranga kōrero Wīwī pōuriuri, ngā hītori, ki te ao whānui me hōna hononga whakapapa.

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Fiona Pardington has photographed museum objects since 2001. Her series Āhua: A beautiful hesitation comprises photographs of life-casts made by Frenchman Pierre-Marie Alexandre Dumoutier of people living in Te Moana nui-a-Kiwa in the nineteenth century. Dumoutier was a skilled anatomist and cast maker, and explorer Jules Sébastien César Dumont d’Urville purposefully included him in his third voyage across the oceans of the Southern Hemisphere (1837–1841). At the time the casts were part of the now discredited nineteenth-century pseudo-science of phrenology to aid the interpretation of character and intellect. Over 50 casts made on the voyage were deposited in European collections.

Photographed in the Musee de l’Homme, Paris, Portrait of a life cast of Matoua Tawai is evidence of colonial objectification of Pacific peoples. Similar attitudes have been perpetuated in the loss of the 19th century documentation of the cast, which has raised doubts about the accuracy of its attribution to Matoua Tawai. Honouring a Māori ancestor, Pardington’s photograph elevates the male depicted with his Tā moko bringing him out of the dark French archive and histories into a larger world of whakapapa connections.

— Text developed for Te Hau Whakatonu: A Series of Never-ending Beginnings (5 August 2023–11 February 2024), curated by Taarati Taiaroa