The ocean is calling me home : settler-indigenous relationships of Te Moananui a Kiwa : [a thesis submitted to Auckland University of Technology in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Visual Arts (MVA), 2020] / Emily Parr ; supervisors: Dieneke Jansen, Natalie Robertson.
'The ocean is calling me home: settler-indigenous relationships of Te Moananui a Kiwa' seeks to understand whose waters I come from, what my waka look like, and how I might come to know my stories. Through looking to specific settler-indigenous relationships I descend from, my moving-image...
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| Format: | Ethesis |
| Language: | English |
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| Online Access: | Click here to access this resource online |
| Summary: | 'The ocean is calling me home: settler-indigenous relationships of Te Moananui a Kiwa' seeks to understand whose waters I come from, what my waka look like, and how I might come to know my stories. Through looking to specific settler-indigenous relationships I descend from, my moving-image research project considers the macrocosm - the web of relationships we are all a part of - and the microcosm - my own relationships with whakapapa, ancestral stories and homelands. Within a paradigm of relationality, my research is guided by whakapapa and storying methodologies emerging from indigenous worldviews. Whakapapa - the placing in layers - offers a filmic language through which to connect relational fragments, while storying is a framework through which to weave these layers together into living narratives. Seeking stories in mountains, burial places, archives, museums, and waters, this research journeys to three ancestral homelands: Tauranga Moana in Aotearoa, Upolu in the Sāmoan Islands, and Tongatapu and Vava'u in the Kingdom of Tonga. Moving-image works traverse seven generations, from Europe to Oceania, through layering video, sound, drawings, and narrative voiceover. Stories unfold across a series of six works, and act as portals to an additional two works. The camera is relational, connecting my ancestors and I through time, as we are tethered by place. Each story links to another, threading loops through space and time, spinning the web of relationships. Against a backdrop of expanding empires, this research untangles questions: How have colonial logics of blood quantum become tools for the dispossession of identity? Who is missing from the archive, and how might I connect more deeply with my ancestors through ritual and ceremony? Whispers, traces, and stories of my tīpuna wāhine coalesce: in gathering and braiding these threads with my own, I honour their lives and strengthen our collective story through moving-image practice. This transformational research project is a haerenga - a journey - of reconnection with whakapapa, with ancestral relationships, and with Te Moananui a Kiwa: the ocean and her islands from which these relationships emerged. Author supplied keywords: Relationality; Storying; Whakapapa; Haerenga; Archives; Museums; Layering; Colonisation; Ceremony; Early encounters; Land Wars; Empire expansion; Ancestral homelands; Moving-image artwork; Settler-Indigenous relationships; Reconnection; Whatuora. |
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| Physical Description: | 1 online resource |
| Bibliography: | Includes bibliographical references. |