Artist and architect, Raukura Turei (Ngāi Tai ki Tāmak, Ngā Rauru Kītahi), has been selected as a finalist for the country’s premier showcase of contemporary clay practices.
The multi-disciplinary artist, who has two works in contention for awards, is one of 40 finalists in the Portage Ceramic Awards 2024.
Her pieces Piere Nuku and Nau mai e hine will be showcased at Auckland’s Te Uru gallery in Titirangi alongside the other finalists’ “exceptional works”, from November through February.
“It’s a real honour to share the works that I have in this particular exhibition at Te Uru because within these works is onepū [sands] collected from Te Hau a Uru, Te Tai o Rehua,” Turei told Te Ao Māori News.
“They will be shared on the whenua of Te Kawerau ā Maki in that particular gallery, which honour family histories of mine in the area.”
Turei says she was invited to submit for the awards because of her interesting practice.
“Because I’m primarily a painter, I was asked specifically to submit works by curators of the gallery who I’ve worked with before because I work with uku [clay] a lot as a medium.
“But not in the typical medium of making ceramics, but in my painting practice.”
Turei’s work is centred around the use of whenua and its connections to her whakapapa and whānau histories. She often uses natural materials collected from papatūānuku in her practice.
“I use all different types of whenua gathered from areas of significance to me within Tāmaki Makaurau, on the east and west coast.
“Such as aumoana, which is a blue alluvial clay, or onepū which I get from Te Uru, the west coast, kerewhenua [yellow clay], kōkōwai [red ochre], different ochres.
“I use all of these different pigments in my painting practice and I build up a very layered texture on the surface.
“I think there’s something in that that triggered an interest within the curators to want to submit for this award.”
Turei’s delighted she accepted the invitation.
“Very wonderfully surprised to see that it’s become a finalist. That’s really exciting.”
‘The whenua has a mana of its own’
Each piece she’s submitted has a special significance for Turei.
“I chose two smallish works,” she says.
“They’re not very large works but they were two works in my studio that have two quite distinct [attributes].
“I guess, both the way that the different whenua have behaved on the surface and the different characteristics of the outcome.”
“One is called Piere Nuku, which speaks to both this idea of great difficulty and hard work and hard labour.
“When I think about stories of my tūpuna, stories of my kuia and reflecting a little bit on the history of her life, and the difficulty for our tūpuna whāea and our wāhine Māori.
“It’s also a play on the clay cracking. On the surface of this work, the clay has cracked and formed these wonderful cracking formations across the surface.
“I like to think that the whenua carries its own pūrākau, and I don’t have the ability to control the outcomes of the whenua.
“The whenua has a mana of its own. I find those pūrākau come through as well as my own.”
“The other work is called Nau mai e hine,” says Turei.
“In this particular work, I bring together the aumoana from Umupuia, where my Ngāi Tai ki Tāmak marae sits on Tikapa Moana. And the onepū from Te Uru in an act of my own reconnection back to my marae on the east coast.
“Bringing a part of my kuia from the west back to her tūrangawaewae. Bringing those materials together and as a little bit of a homecoming.”
Raukura Turei has a solo show opening at Season Aotearoa in Grey Lynn on November 2. The winners of the Portage Ceramic Awards 2024 will be announced on November 21.