'Call a friend you have not spoken to for a long time'

This was our brief. We were given one and a half days.

I made a sculpture of can phones. Like the ones you used to play with back in the days! I am making a comment on how we no longer use the home phone to communicate. These days we all text, email or facebook.

Theres something special about receiving a phone call...or a letter.

Domestic Front

Billy

tamariki swimming

curious

observer

koro

mist

boys in the shed

ally running away from the church

Moody skies of the Hokianga

I have been working really hard on my first University assignment. The theme was our 'domestic front' so I went 'home'; back to the roots and took these photos at my marae and around Kohukohu.

Every photo has a little narrative. Every place is symbolic. 

Community

I journeyed North again. I took a five hour bus journey at 8.30 on Tuesday morning. My uncle had passed away and there was lots of activity happening down at the marae.

Dad had 'dropped' a cow. My brothers had spent the previous two days fishing. Dad spent the evening scaling, gutting and cleaning the fish. In the early hours of the morning he gathered mussels and oysters. On the day of the Tangi we were up at 5.30am to dig the grave.

Meanwhile the women of the marae are up at 6.00am cutting onions, cooking steak, making salads, kneading fried bread, boiling kumara, prepping meat, mashing potatoes, buttering bread... All day and all night there was a frenzy of activity as the Marae catered to the hundred odd people who attended tangi.

It is such a beautiful thing for me to be immersed by my own whanau uniting and standing strong on a sad occasion.

Just a few quick shots I took. There are lots of photos to look at still. I shot some film so I'm excited to see how they turn out too.

cousins on the wharf 

our church

lone cloud over my awa

my brother

little boy smiling

family portrait

beautiful old kuia

Winters Coming

We (The Moa Unlimited girls) threw together this last minute winter photo shoot on Friday and these are my favourite images. We were shooting at a beautiful spot out west in Titirangi. It poured with rain as though the weather knew we were preparing for the winter to come.

in the blink of an eye

Art by Wert and Fluroo

In the blink of an eye...the world changes

This piece was done in the Christchurch CBD after the first earthquake. I wonder if the piece is still there after the 22nd of February or if it is covered in rubble. 

I asked Fluroo why she decided to write that particular phrase and if it had any thing to do with the earthquake in September. She told me that she got sick of writing her name over and over again. She said it was meaningless. This phrase was alluding to the earthquake but also trying to tell us that wonderful things can happen in a blink of an eye too. We need to be positive in these uncertain times. Her letters were awfully cheerful!  

Christchurch

abandoned and decorated

photos by wert

life in numbers

photo by Misha

This fortnight in numbers:

I...

started at two different Universities

got caught up in two natural disasters

moved cities two times

missed two flights back to Auckland

unpacked and packed eight times

baked two cakes 

missed one lecture

received two major assignments

learnt about hundreds of new artists

discovered one new shop

did one photo shoot

learnt five new tricks on photoshop