Simon Kaan (Kāi Tahu, Kāti Māmoe, Waitaha) and I have studios in the same building, so it was pretty easy to organise a lunch to talk about Te Au, his recent exhibition with Wi Taepa (Ngāti Pikiao, Te Roro-o-te-Rangi, Te Arawa, Te Ātiawa) at Sanderson Contemporary in Tāmaki Makaurau. Simon would bring the soup and I’d bring the bread. I flinched a little when I saw mushroom soup, with more brown mushrooms to heat up on the grill with butter. I’m not a fan of mushrooms. But when Simon asked if I liked them, I said “Yip!” in a real high voice. Luckily, our tangential kōrero instigated by Te Au was much more enjoyable. We orbited the three shows Simon and Wi have had together annually since 2021 at Sanderson, using them as a springboard to talk about their connection to each other, collaboration and care.
Their first exhibition together, Te Hā o te Marama, in 2021 evolved from Wi’s residency at the Dunedin School of Art in the same year, where he took over the ceramic studio for two months. Twenty years prior, Wi and Simon had exhibited together in Wellington’s Kura Gallery, where the artists swapped works with each other. Wi gifted Simon a hīnaki-shaped clay ipu and Simon gifted Wi a painting. Since then, the artists have lived with, followed and supported each other’s work. Unsurprisingly, as often happens with favourite people, Wi and Simon share a favourite Un- cle, Te Hei Piraka, which no doubt helped to foster this tuakana–teina relationship.
During the residency, Wi prompted Simon to make the iconic floating waka from his paintings into a three-dimensional form using clay, while he also developed his own Simon-inspired clay waka. The rendition of an image that has lived its life on a flat surface into a physical form feels a bit magical. Both Wi and Simon have distinct visual languages, yet their vocabularies seem familiar, as they both speak across vessels and memory, and employ similar palettes. In their 2022 exhibition, Maumahara, Simon’s prints and paintings featured his characteristic lenticular sections of etched horizons foregrounding a rising moon, while Wi’s iconic uku was disguised as an anchor stone, cross-hatched iron ore or black-as-night volcanic rock.
What is not always seen when viewing their work is the necessity for both artists to be in communion with others. It is a testament to the strength of the individual practices that they have maintained such a strong voice in their own works, while generating, fostering and encouraging other artists to do the same. Providing this kind of space is no easy feat and is often relegated to engaging with younger or emerging practitioners. But what I think this series of exhibitions between Simon and Wi displays is a way to care for and share space with artists that are our tuākana. How do we look after our elders in the art world? Simon and I traversed an array of ideas over our soup, from an artist’s pension or a senior fellowship with a full year’s salary, to a special fund reserved for kaumātua artists where they don’t have to fill out a CNZ application. And what do senior artists need to continue making and exhibiting, beyond remuneration? And if we really want to go down the rabbit hole—where do their archives go? How do we go about being supportive without being patronising, or doing it for our own cultural-capital gain?
Making and showing work feeds artists, regardless of our age and stage. Maintaining a practice is a way of keeping a form of knowledge alive. The simple gesture of Simon sharing exhibitions with Wi is an example of an artist taking stock of their own platform and inviting their tuakana to be a part of it too. Their exhibitions have flowed from being in active collaboration with each other to the current exhibition, where the collaboration is not as visible, but the intent to share space is.
Te Au is filled with exciting new and extant work from Simon, which he wasn’t too fussed about focusing on when we spoke. Rather, it was the relational aspect of the exhibitions that generated conversation. There is a central plinth that holds three of Wi’s ceramic kūmara pou whenua—named after the Pūtangirua Pinnacles, situated on the eastern side of Cape Palliser. These three markers are etched, carved and glazed to look as if they were made of wood, and each possesses a shadowy trail of small pebbles, indicative of time and slow movement. The show pivots around these works; they affirm the artists’ relationship to each other and announce it as central to the exhibition. In te reo Māori, ‘au’ has many meanings, but the one I’m drawn to is the wake (of a canoe), as a wider signifier, not only of the exhibition, but the reciprocity between the artists.
