Join us for a morning of storytelling and making through this mixed media sparkly tiki workshop with artist Maungarongo Te Kawa.

In this workshop, you will create a tiki figure in Ron’s signature style to take home. No sewing experience is required as we will use glue, fabric, paper, and of course, sparkles, to bring our tikis to life.

This is the first of two workshops led Maungarongo Te Kawa to kick off our weekend of celebrating his exhibition The Whakapapa of Moonlight. The afternoon workshop session is here, and Sunday will hold a Coffee & Croissants kōrero between Te Kawa and Objectspace’s Zoe Black.

Bookings are essential and spaces are limited. This workshop is suitable for people aged 14 and upwards.

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Maungarongo Te Kawa (Ngāti Porou) has been working prolifically in fashion, art, community and education in Aotearoa New Zealand for the past three decades. Using sewing as a conduit to connect with people, he expertly guides workshop participants to confidently create with fabric and express their genealogy through sewing.

Over two decades, Te Kawa’s distinctive quilting style has explored mātauranga Māori (knowledge) and his whakapapa (genealogy) through bold colour and a tactile application of materials. Breaking the rules of traditional quilt construction, many types of fabric are masterfully stitched together to illustrate scenes from his imagination, his history and the stories of the people influential to his life.

Te Kawa has exhibited throughout Aotearoa, including solo exhibitions in 2021 at Centre of Contemporary Art Toi Moroki and Objectspace, and in 2020 at Te Kōputu a te whanga a Toi, Whakatāne.

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The Whakapapa of Moonlight comes from the exhibition Te Whare Pora: a sacred space that includes works by Te Kawa from the past three years alongside three new quilts reflecting the core pou of his practice:w Te Whare Pora, the sacred zone of making; Hineteiwaiwa, the guiding atua (deity) for creativity; and Waipunarangi, the source of ancestral guidance and inspiration.

Te Whare Pora: a sacred space is supported by Norwegian Crafts and Creative New Zealand and developed by Objectspace. It has been shown at Nitja senter for samtidskunst, Lillestrøm, Norway, Sámi Dáiddaguovddáš, Karasjok, Sápmi, and Te Manawa Museum, Palmerston North, Aotearoa. It will open at its final venue, Tairawhiti Museum, Tairawhiti, Aotearoa, on 29 November 2024.