TUKU IHO - Living Legacy Exhibition of the Honored Maori Artwork

Mr. James Rickard, Master wood Carver

Me with mr. Brian and Lee Khai 

The Tuku Iho is an exhibition of time honored Maori Artworks brought to the Museum at USM by the New Zealand Maori Arts and Crafts Institute. A national organization responsible for the protection, promotion and perpetuation of Maori Arts, Crafts and Culture. Alongside it many interest, the Institute runs the national school of wood carving, jade and stone and bone carving, weaving and canoe building.
Adapted from the Exhibition Catalogue.

If I can do a cultural study of a people I would definitely choose the Maori culture and its people; theirs is a culture that has been a fascination for me eversince my eldest brother sent back from new Zealand  a ruler that had all the different wood found in the country. Late upon his return from NewZealand where he had studied he also taught us at the school the maori Haka and a song that i can never forget called Pokare Kare.

Every now and then i wuld stumble upon something to do with Maori Art and culture like the last time when I found a book on Maori Tattoos which i have since misplaced it somewhere, my bad. The book had a thorough study of some of the Maori customs having to do with how and where and what tattoos are for the people.

The Maoris to me are also the native epole who has suffered the sane fate as most indigenous people all over the world at the hands of the Europeans in the early days of Imperialism and colonialism. They are also victims of their own weaknesses when it comes to adopting the bad habits such as alcohol consumption brought over by the Europeans. 

Like the Australian and the Native Americans, and many others, the Maoris lost their cultural heritage  and today only a handfull of true blooded Maoris survive to bear witness to the downfall of their way of life and sought to preserve whatever is left of it.  Maori wood carving is one of those cultural inheritance that is very well known all over the world for its unique design and  meticulous execution.

Although most of the art pieces are done by the few who have taken the task upon themselves to become preservers of the Maori wood carving art, they still carry for me the elegance and the refine taste of aesthetic beauty in expressing what is one's cultural heritage. The works exudes a sense of melancholy in a sense that these were once the pride possesions of a very proud nation living on the Island of New Zealand. 

The works also tells of an evolution of a culture from primitive to what it is today, a symbol of the past belonging to the people whose lives was and perhaps still is connected to nature and the spirit world. 

 To behold these pieces up close is a gift and I hope many will come to honor them while they are on display here at the University in Georgetown for this is indeed a Living Legacy of a people whose lives is not that much different from ours.