Mana Takatāpui: Taera Tāne

City Gallery Wellington | Te Whare Toi

Deane Gallery: 29 January–10 April 2011

Fear Brampton, Tanu Gago, Richard Kereopa, Dan Taulapapa McMullin, Hoteera Riri

Curated by Reuben Friend

In Mana Takatāpui: Taera Tāne, five artists of Samoan and Māori descent offer perspectives on male gay sexuality. Unlocking stereotypes and exploring double standards, they explore the interplay of culture and sexuality. ‘Takatāpui’ refers to the indigenous understanding of gay sexuality, signifying that identity is informed as much by culture and ethnicity as by gender and sexuality. ‘Mana takatāpui’ refers to takatāpui communities standing proud within their own cultural skins.

Looking back on this project from 2010-11, I observe the artists in the exhibition (and the curator) working through a range of labels and pronouns, some of which have come into common language, and others which have dissolved and been discarded. Further to this, looking back on this project, we all own thanks to the research of Dr Ngahuia Te Awe Kotuku for her work to popularise the Māori language version of the Tutanekai and Tiki story, as told by Te Rangikaheke, from which encouraged the term takatāpui into mainstream use for Māori LGBTQ2 communities at that time.

The following is the essay I authored for the exhibition catalogue in 2010.

Mana Takatapui: Taera Tāne

The famous Māori love story of Hinemoa and Tutanekai, as recorded by Te Rangikaheke in Sir George Grey's Nga Mahi a nga Tupuna Maori (1854), introduces the term hoa takatāpui or beloved friend of the same sex. Hinemoa was the beautiful chieftainess who one night, guided by the sound of Tutanekai's flute, swam the great distance across Lake Rotorua to be with him on Mokoia Island. However, before their union, Tutanekai had another intimate relationship with a male companion named Tiki.

Tiki, after Tutanekai's union with Hinemoa, became very lonely and lamented the loss of Tutanekai, his hoa takatapui. While it is unclear whether their relationship extended to sexual intimacy, the term takatāpui clearly expresses a special bond characterised by aroha (love) and whanaungatanga (kinship). In recent decades, takatapui has come to describe an indigenous understanding of gay culture in Aotearoa New Zealand, signifying that a person's identity is informed as much by culture and ethnicity as it is by gender and sexuality.

The term mana takatāpui is therefore an expression of empowerment, enabling takatāpui communities to stand with pride within their own cultural skin. This exhibition considers the changing dynamics of gender roles and sexuality amongst Pacific cultures specifically from the perspective of Taera Tāne, male style or sexual desire.

In the art of Hoteera Riri, takatāpui lifestyles are explored in relation to Western attitudes towards assumed gender roles. Born in the 1950s in the small East Coast township of Opotiki, Riri remembers as a child seeing a number of male kaumatua (elders) who dressed, behaved and were treated in the manner of women - both on the marae (meeting grounds) and in the wider community. In those days he says labels such as takatapui were not commonly used. Consequently Riri has never personally felt the need to ascribeto such a label. Instead he simply describes his wairua (spirit) as tāne ira wāhine, male with a feminine soul.

Mana Takatāpui, 2011, custom mannequins and adornments by Hoteera Riri in the Deane Gallery at City Gallery Wellington

Moving to central Auckland in the 1970s, during an intense period of homophobia and gay activism, Riri was introduced to a new world of prejudice and hostility. Referencing Fiona Clark's groundbreaking Go Girls (1975), photographs of gay and transgender men in Auckland, Riri has created four lifelike sculptures of aging drag queens. Riri says during his time in Auckland he became close friends with many of Clark's Go Girls, several of whom have sadly since passed away. Riri's sculptures pay homage to this generation, who led the charge for gay rights in the early days of the gay liberation movement in New Zealand.

Samoan artist and poet Dan Taulapapa McMullin was born in Japan in 1957 and grew up in American Samoa during the 1960s. Like Riri, in his youth he experienced an era when attitudes towards sexuality and gender roles were more relaxed. Taking narratives from Samoan faagono (proverbial folk tales), Taulapapa McMullin celebrates the special place which fa afafine occupy in Samoan culture.

Often described as the third sex, fa'afafine is a male gender designation in which the axis of masculine and feminine, and heterosexual and homosexual, is fluid. As a self-described fa'afafine, Taulapapa McMullin states that he exists in the liminal space between genders. In his art he seeks to decolonise attitudes towards male sexuality and perceived male gender roles in the Pacific.

Afio mai, acrylic on canvas by Dan Taulapapa McMullin in Mana Takatāpui: Taera Tāne, 2011

Tanu Gago, a young Samoan video and photographic artist, observed that it is culturally acceptable for fa'afafine to enjoy sexual encounters with both men and women, while sexual relations between two tauatane, masculine or non-effeminate gay men, are discouraged. Gago references Taulapapa McMullin's poem entitled Jerry, Sheree and the Eel to explore this double standard.

In the poem Jerry is a fa afafine who each night dresses as a woman named Sheree. Jerry is given an enchanted eel that grows to an enormous size and one night, not recognising Jerry in his feminine form, the eel chases Sheree right out of the village. Gago's reinterpretation of this tale poses Jerry as a closeted gay man with insecurities about his sexuality. Gago suggests that Jerry assumes the persona of the fa'afafine in order to escape the cultural taboo of masculine homosexuality.

In addressing the tensions between these dual identities, Gago's photography publicly 'outs' closeted Polynesian men. Making their sexuality plainly visible puts an end to this duality and forces Pacific communities to confront negative attitudes towards homosexuality.

Iona, Daniel, Leo, Tanu, photographic prints (2011) by Tanu Gago in Mana Takatāpui: Taera Tāne

Fractured identities and the desire to conform are also prominent themes in the art of Māori performance artist Richard Kereopa. Kereopa says in his youth he outwardly projected a masculine persona as a protective mechanism, concealing his inherent waira wāhine or femininity. Desiring to consolidate these identities, Kereopa now ascribes to the label whakawāhine. Similar to the Samoan fa'afafine, Kereopa poses whakawāhine as an alternative Māori gender designation in which the axis of masculine and feminine is also fluid.

Kereopa's artworks pose the masculine and feminine as alter-egos in conversation with each other. Uninhibited and free to speak their minds, these characters publicly play out Kereopa's struggle to create a turangawaewae or cultural grounding for himself as a takatāpui man.

Gay Mes (Games), 2010, postcard series by Richard Kereopa

This desire for a takatāpui turangawaewae is shared by photographic artist Fear Brampton. For Brampton takatāpuitanga (takatāpui culture) is a bridge between the past and the present, and between te ao Māori (the Māori) world and the wider world.

Brampton makes the observation that while the term takatāpui acknowledges a broad spectrum of Māori gender and sexual orientations, he also poses the term tāne moe tāne, men who sleep with men, as a personal expression of his sexuality. Tāne moe tāne is an unambiguous term which signals sexual desire without the implied connotations of femininity or the transposition of gendered identity.

Brampton's photographic montages address the marginalisation and censorship of takatāpui histories and identity through a process of whakatika tikanga, that is the readdressing of historical and current attitudes towards Māori male sexuality.

Photographic series by Fear Brampton in Mana Takatapui: Taera Tane

Finding strength in one's identity enables people to confront a variety of challenges with confidence. Mana Takatapui: Taera Tane is therefore as much about confronting stereotypes and challenging negative perceptions as it is about exploring and celebrating male sexuality. As Brampton puts it tuwhakatangioratanga, a joyful engagement in making a place in the world for takatāpui.

Reuben Friend

Curator Māori and Pacific Art

Artist Biographies

Hoteera Riri (Te Whakatōhea, Te Whanau-a-Apanui) holds a Bachelor of Mãori Visual Arts from Toimairangi School of Mãori Visual Arts, Te Wananga o Aotearoa, Hastings (2007). Currently he is artist in residence at the special effects department of the Cut Above Academy in Auckland.

Dan Taulapapa McMullin (Sāmoa) lives in Laguna, California, USA. He has had many residencies and exhibited extensively internationally. Most recently he exhibited in Samoan Art: Urban (2010) at the De Young Fine Arts Museum of San Francisco where he was artist in residence, and currently has a solo exhibition at the Gorman Museum, University of California.

Tanu Gago (Sāmoa) lives in Auckland and holds a Bachelor of Screen and Performing Arts from Unitec, Auckland (2009). Recently he exhibited his first solo video installation YOU LOVE MY FRESH (2010) at Te Tuhi Centre for the Arts, Auckland.

Richard Kereopa (Te Arawa, Ngati Túwharetoa, Tainui, Ngã Puhi) holds a Masters of Fine Arts from Whitecliffe College of Art and Design (2009) and currently tutors Raranga (weaving) contemporary practice at Waiariki Institute of Technology, Rotorua.

Fear Brampton (Te Rarawa, Te Aupōuri, Kai Tahu, Waitaha, English, Scottish) holds a Masters of Art and Design from Auckland University of Technology (2009), a Bachelor of Fine Art from the University of Auckland (1987) and a Bachelor of Science also from the University of Auckland (1982).