Pūrākau

Pūrākau is one part of Kura Moana installations created by Artist in Focus Lisa Reihana, Commissioned by Aotearoa New Zealand Festival of Arts, 2022.

Rerehua ana tāna topaki i runga i te pouwhenua i runga o Taone ki Piriti Moana

He kapo whakaahua tāna mahi, otirā he kōrero mō te whakaatuatanga.

Te Wheke o Muturangi calmly surveys passers-by, sensuously hovering above the City to Sea Bridge navigational pouwhenua. Te Wheke o Muturangi takes selfies and tells us about becoming a deity.

Te Wheke o Muturangi - Jahra Wasasala

Concept - Lisa Reihana

DOP - Gareth Moon

Grip - Fraser McKay

VFX - Assembly Ltd: Clare Bone, Damon Duncan, Rhys Dippie, Matt von Trott, Elliot Stronge, Matt Wilson

Sound Design - James Pinker & Sean Cooper

Costume - Bob Buck

Hair & Makeup: Stefan Knight

Production Coordinator: Ruby Reihana-Wilson

Hair & Makeup Assist - Luana Millar

Costume Standby - Dan Cruden, Ani O'Neil

Costume Makers - Shona Ward, Gillie Coxill, Dan Cruden, Ani O'Neil

Runner: Jaya Beach-Robertson

Thanks to Ana Hiini, TAPAC

More info can be found at https://festival.nz/kuramoana

Pūrākau

Firstly, find me a witness.

I have decided to peel

the mythology from my body.

Humans, Bodies full of mouths,

Heads full of prophecies,

yet not enough language.

To hold anyone that is more than one, at once

Empty your stomach of rubies, guns and earth.

Remember what the omnipotent tastes like.

I have no room for mercy,

only for beginnings

I know the terrors imagination,

the brilliance of birth

I do not belong to a wounded ocean

And neither did she

She has as many names

as there are days to be born

But look for her, she cannot be found

The god has swallowed the saga whole

The name has climbed back up into the mouth

A voice with so much blood in it

Listen, as it summons the va from

in-between her own legs

her children are marked as medicine, as ancestory.

All of whom have ingested every tired world before

They have spun the old violence

like silk through teeth

A name like hers,

A name like that knows what is needed to build a pantheons body