'The Great Separation', Kinetic Mobile

Project: Tatau Pounamu

In a traditional sense Tatau Pounamu is a peace agreement between two parties, yet if we look closer into the dynamics of this agreement we see that Tatau Pounamu is an event that brings forth a permanent state of change from instability to stability. Tatau (doorway) implies event, whilst pounamu (New Zealand jade) implies a sense of permanence.

For this project I decided to focus on the biggest example of Tatau Pounamu I could find, the separation of Ranginui and Papatūānuku (heaven and earth). For this reason I decided to depict the main atua who were involved, connected and presented in a mobile form to evoke balance, freedom and movement.

The mobile portrays the exact moment separation occurred, hence we have Tūmatauenga and Tumatakaka holding the sacred toki used to sever their parents' arms from their embrace. We have Uepoto pointing to the way out and Tāne in his classic propped-up position along with Tū-pai.

I organised the atua paddles in a specific order according to our chakra locations. This is because I view the atua Māori as dual personifications of our chakras (inner world) and our world's natural phenomena (outer world).

I relate this knowledge to Tatau Pounamu because once separation occurred then Tāne obtained the three baskets of knowledge, of which all the atua were assigned to their duties.