Star Gossage, Girl of the Dawn Mist, 2020. Oil on linen, 30.5 x 30.5cm. Courtesy: the artist and Tim Melville Gallery, New Zealand.

As another Waitangi Day looms and the complex and shifting relationships between Maori and Pakeha are foregrounded once again, Tim Melville Gallery presents the exhibition Release the Stars, with artwork by Hiria Anderson, Russ Flatt, Star Gossage, Brett Graham, Ayesha Green, Nikau Hindin, PĀNiA!, and Fiona Pardington. Through their work, these artists speak powerfully and insistently about being Maori, today, in 21st Century Aotearoa.

The exhibition asks: who are some of the other Maori artists whose work feels Maori but doesn’t always look Maori? Who are some of the others whose practice doesn’t necessarily include the iconography that many understand as signifying ‘authentic’ Maori art?  And if you were able to put some of these artists together what might an exhibition look like?

Exhibition opens: 6–8pm Tuesday 11 February 2020