In mid-October, the recipients of the 2023 Arts Pasifika Awards were announced at a ceremony held at Te Whanganui-a-Tara Wellington’s Te Papa Tongarewa. The awards represent a full spectrum of Pasifika arts across the disciplines, recognising emerging and contemporary practitioners, as well as those who have made a significant contribution to heritage artforms and the promotion of the arts amongst the disability communities in Aotearoa. Arguably the top prize of the evening is the Senior Pacific Artist Award, which this year went jointly to visual artists Lonnie Hutchinson and Ani O’Neill.

That Hutchinson and O’Neill should be acknowledged as artistic leaders is a full-circle moment. Each has cemented their artwork in customary knowledges and practices held and passed on by the women in their own lives; Hutchinson through the feminine and feminist narratives she tells through her signature cut-out sculptures; O’Neill through her use of the handicrafts, crochet and tīvaevae, taught to her by her Rarotongan grandmother, Mama Pareu Ebera Nia. This award recognises how both artists have borne the torch for the next generation of practitioners.

Other awardees include Lavinia Lovo (Pacific Toa Award), Losalia Milika Pusiaki Fifita (Pacific Heritage Artist Award), Katrina Iosia (Pacific Contemporary Artist Award), Falepipi he Mafola Niuean Handcraft Inc. (Special Recognition Award), David Feauai-Afaese (Emerging Pacific Artist Award) and Hayden Afele-Nickel (Iosefa Enari Memorial Award).