Material Considerations in a Painting Practice: Reciprocal Creation With Papatūānuku Through Embodied Fieldwork

Abstract

This practice-led research explores materiality across space and time in relation to the environment from a te ao Māori perspective by means of painting, fieldwork, and installation. Through making paint from gathered materials and non-plastic binders, I explore my relationship to Papatūānuku, an atua wahine, an ancestor, embodied as the Earth. By painting outdoors in the local area (rohe) where I stay (kāinga noho) and in places I visit, I seek to ground and connect viscerally to place. Tending, as an action of care, is a means to practise relating well (whakawhanaungatanga) that references stewardship (kaitiakitanga) and reciprocity (utu), which can deepen my connection to place and mana whenua. The installation of paintings as objects opens up the concept of material connection and reciprocity.