Maungarongo Te Kawa translates the Māori title for this work as ‘The Hull that Breaks the Dawn Horizon’. He made it in memory of all the men, including many of his friends, who died as the result of HIV/AIDS in the years before treatment was known or widely available. Maungarongo made a glittering, impossible-to-ignore vessel to carry away mamae (pain) or any sense of shame. “We, the survivors, captain our own waka and navigate our own voyage,” he has said.

“We sail towards our dreams with love, spirit, liberation, and style. As we journey through the ocean towards the horizon, a fine mist is created at the prow. It sprays up and covers the whole waka, and when the sun shines through, it creates a rainbow. A tohu of peace, connection, forgiveness, total abundance and eternal aroha. For all the ones that didn’t make it.”

(Perilous: Unheard Stories from the Collection, 6 August 2022- 21 July 2024)

One of the most talented printmakers of her generation, Adele Younghusband excelled with the linocut. She was based in Australia between 1937 and 1940 where she worked alongside leading Australian modernist artists of the day, including George Bell. It was here that she was introduced to modern art concepts such as abstraction and surrealism. In 1941 the pioneering progressive nature of her work was singled out in Art in New Zealand where it was noted that artists such as Adele where crucial to a new modern aesthetic consciousness.

Ink on Paper: Aotearoa New Zealand Printmakers of the Modern Era, 11 February – 28 May 2023