Chris Bailey Exhibitions

Chris Bailey

Nō Hea Koe?

12 Feb - 8 Mar 2022

Exhibition Works

Pou Atua Tuatahi
Pou Atua Tuatahi (2021)
Pou Atua Tuarua
Pou Atua Tuarua (2021)
Pou Atua Tuatoru
Pou Atua Tuatoru (2021)
Te Ngau o te Rangi
Te Ngau o te Rangi (2021)
Te Iti ō Hauraki
Te Iti ō Hauraki (2021)
Whaka-mau-maharatanga
Whaka-mau-maharatanga (2017-21)
Ngā Uri o Piako
Ngā Uri o Piako (2020)
Ko Moehau o Poutini te Maunga
Ko Moehau o Poutini te Maunga (2021)

artist interview

 
Chris Bailey talks about his new exhibiton, Nō Hea Koe?, at Milford Galleries Dunedin. Video production: 03 Media.
 
 
Chris Bailey, Pou Atua Tuatahi, Tuarua, Tuatoru (2021) Installation view
 

exhibition text

The phrase ‘body of work’ is especially fitting for this collection of carved and cast sculptures by Chris Bailey (Ngāti Hako, Ngāti Pāoa, Te Aupouri, Ngāti Porou, Irish). Bailey describes them as a manifestation of his pepeha: the carvings physically describe the artist’s relationship to the whenua and to his tupuna. They are marker posts that situate the sculptor firmly in te ao Māori - past, present, and future.

Tōtara’s renowned longevity and status as a rakau rangatira is fitting for Te Iti ō Hauraki, which speaks of the artist’s female ancestor Ruawhea, whose ancestral claim to Hauraki allowed the descendants of Marutuahu to enter the area once she married Tamaterā. The work depicts Ruawhea flanked by her offspring, who feature in the whakapapa of many Hauraki iwi. (1)

Haere mai, nau mai
Haere mai, kuhu noa mai ki ngā hūhā o Ruawhea
 
Come forth, welcome,
Come forth and enter the thighs of Ruawhea. (2)

The wood gleams with life. The shou sugi ban (3) finish lends a rich lustre to the tōtara, enhancing the feeling that the soft indentations covering the surfaces could have been pressed into the tōtara by their maker’s hand alone. The carvings have a sensuous fleshiness that resonates with the saying they reference.

Once no longer fit for sea-going, waka hulls were often used to mark places of importance, including burial sites. The wooden Whaka-mau-maharatanga pays respect to Te Kōpuarahi, the urupa where Bailey’s tupuna rest just behind his marae, Kerepēhi. The cast bronze Ngā Uri ō Piako refer to those whose awa is the Piako, once fed by the (now drained) wetlands of the Hauraki Plains (4).  The weighty permanence of bronze is a reminder that the river is a taonga whose wealth lies both in its resources and in its mauri, each vital for the people’s well-being.

Pou Atua Tuatahi, Tuarua, and Tuatoru (The First, Second and Third Posts that reach to the Heavens) are works with which Bailey confronts the suppression of mātauraunga Māori by colonising powers. The pou re-assert their place on the land as they reach skywards in the same way as the artist seeks to re-engage with the knowledge and practices which structured the physical and spiritual worlds of tangata whenua for centuries.

It is not by chance that the surfaces of Chris Bailey’s works ripple like the sea or like the scales of fish. It was Tangaroa, god of the seas, who gave toi whakairo to tangata whenua and each tap of the toki inscribes the language of the moana and the whenua. By looking to the past and working in the present, Chris Bailey has created taonga for the future. He exhorts us likewise to drink with our eyes.
 
1. Artist’s statement, 2022
2. Ibid.
3. Hand-polished, flame-charred timber.
4. Artist’s statement, 2022.

Exhibition Views