This work centres on a private archive of ancestral photographs dating to the 1800s — Exploring the tension between oral tradition and fragmented photographic evidence, through themes of loss, survival, and return through the lens of my whakapapa (roots, lineage, family) and colonial-era documentation.
Artist Statement
In my whānau, much of what we know has come through people. But through the passage of time, stories that are constantly repeated change. Names are misremembered, connections become unexplained. The photographs have always existed, but our understanding of each one slowly shifts and takes on new meaning.
By exploring the tension between oral tradition and fragmented photographic evidence, through themes of loss, survival and return, a different understanding begins to form. I have become increasingly aware of how easily knowledge can shift or disappear. A photograph can survive much longer than the memory that gives it context. An attempt to reimagine a past that can only be constructed by the present.
Photography is often spoken about as a way of preserving something. The longer I spend with these images, the less certain I am of what has actually been preserved.