Ringa Toi is the annual showcase of artwork by secondary school students hosted by the New Zealand Qualifications Authority (NZQA).
This year students from 126 schools were selected from across the motu to exhibit more than 150 art pieces at the Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa recently.
“Art is really critical because it connects us to the past and also places us in the present but also it gives us hope for the future,” says Utufa’asisili Rosemary Mose, Deputy Chief Executive Pasifika at NZQA.
It’s through art that Rosmini College student Patrick Lemeki is able to gain a better understanding of other cultures through his drawings.
“As a Tongan I think that we definitely are very connected and similar to the Māori,” he says.
“I think that as Pasifika we should be supporting each other especially as people who are indigenous to their land ‘cos I think that there is a lot of similarities in culture and beliefs and stuff and I think that it’s important to show that we stand with the Māori ‘cos we understand them.”
The stories of the past have also been unlocked in a sculpture by Adria Gawn from Waitakere College. Her art piece is on the Dawn Raids of the 1970s.
“My inspiration was my mother as she was a part of the Pasifika people who suffered from the dawn raids and I feel that sometimes the dawn raids are overlooked in everything, I just wanted to make a sculpture for our Pasifika people to be heard and you know to be acknowledged in what they experienced,” she says.
The work is very personal and taken from the artist’s own life experience. For Papakura High School student Savannah Fili, her digital print was a chance to voice a deeper issue.
“My art piece was about the loss of language,” she says.
“Being someone raised overseas, I’ve lost my connection to my language and I’m pretty sure some people can relate to it as well.”
Ringa Toi means artistic hands and now it’s amplifying Pasifika arts and mātauranga Māori as a tool to accelerate student success.
It’s an exciting time for renowned Pasifika artist Michel Tuffery who had the tough job of judging the art works.
Asked to describe how students might be feeling he says, “Empowered, empowered because they are seriously taking on a craft and I can see their future.
“I know that these next ones are coming up and that for me, that’s the investment,” he says
