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Study from Life or One of the Old School, Wiremu Watene Tautari (Ngāti Whātua)

Charles Frederick Goldie Study from Life or One of the Old School, Wiremu Watene Tautari (Ngāti Whātua)

Wiremu Watene Tautari was one of Charles Goldie’s earliest Māori portrait sitters – according to his descendants he met Goldie through the timber shipping business. Tautari was a merchant who ran a substantial kauri trade between the upper Waitematā Harbour and the timber mills of Tāmakimakaurau / Auckland, including one at Commercial Bay operated by the artist’s father, David Goldie, who was also the city’s mayor at the time. As a small boy, Tautari was present in 1841 when Ngāti Whātua gave the Crown the land that would become central Auckland. When almost complete loss of lands followed, he was active throughout his long life in campaigning for the return of Ngāti Whātua rights and land.

(Te Wheke, 2020)

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