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[Manu äwhä © James Benton]
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18 Wynyard St, 1863-2003
The
James Henare Maori Research Centre has been located in a work of
art - a house at 18 Wynyard Street that was originally built
as one of several in that street to provide accommodation
for married army officers during the land wars of the 1860s.
About 60 years later it was purchased by Mr Malcolm Draffin,
a prominent architect who designed the Auckland Museum and
other notable buildings in the city. Mr Draffin expanded the
building, adding to both the front and rear sections. It was
purchased by Sir Ernest Davis for the University in the 1960s,
and further modified to become the Vivien Leigh Theatre, and
as such contributed to the flourishing of the performing arts
in Auckland.
For
the opening of the Centre, the house was further enhanced,
culturally, spiritually and artistically, by the addition
of a front porch with an entranceway (illustrated below) carved under the direction
of Paki Harrison, then artist-in-residence at the University,
and the master carver responsible for overseeing the construction
of Tane-nui-a-Rangi, the wharenui on the University marae.
The koruru (carved head above the doorway) represents Tane
as Kupu, or bearer of the words of knowledge.
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The
lintel above the doorway does not rise to an apex with a tekoteko
on the front, because it is above the portal of a whare wänanga.
The horizontal lintel represents a single layer in a whakapapa,
the next generation below that symbolized by the koruru, with
the carved figures on it symbolic of the varous departments of
knowledge, social, cultural, spiritual and economic, which occupy
the tohunga and tauira within. Each of these kupu is in turn linked
though an aho or thread to one of the rua, respositories and guardians
of knowledge, who support the whole structure. Two of these, Rua-te-pupuke
and Rua-te-kukune, representing the accumulation and dissemination
of knowledge respectively, are manifest in the carvings supporting
the lintel. The presence of the others is inferred from the nature
of the lintel and the physical presence of those two. The carvings
were executed by Paki Harrison and his son Fred. Some of the carving
was done with stone chizels, further underlining the links between
traditional and modern knowledge and technology.
As
noted, the whakapapa of the house itself is of more than passing
interest -- begun to house those brought to New Zealand to secure
colonial interests over those of the Maori, the building passed
through a phase of more tranquil domesticity, became a general
cultural centre, and is now a Taitokerau and Maori presence advancing
Maori interests within the University and community at large.
This
latest phase in the Centre's history began in 1991, with a hui
at Waimanoni, one of a series organized by Maori Land Court Judge
Andrew Spencer to discuss issues of the day, with a focus on the
identification and use of resources. Professor Hugh Kawharu and
Dr Margaret Mutu from the Maori Studies Department were both present
at this hui. The potential role of the University in this process
quickly became evident, hence the move towards establishing a
research programme to get information about the facts governing
resources in Taitokerau, and information and knowledge to enable
Maori people to benefit from them.
It
was decided to have the next hui at Tanenuiarangi in December,
and (Sir) Colin Maiden, the Vice-Chancellor, and Sir Ian Barker,
the Chancellor, were both invited to attend. They accepted the
challenge articulated at the gathering by Dame Mira Szászy:
"What is it that Waikato has and Auckland doesn't that got
the University of Waikato a Maori research centre?". Sir
Ian Barker replied: "You have made your case." As a
result of this, Professor Kawharu was asked to prepare papers
and submit these through the appropriate university channels.
Twelve months later, the proposal arising from these discussions
was submitted to the University Council. The Council approved
the funding of the Centre. The house nearest the Maori Studies
/ marae complex was chosen as the Centre's home and refurbished,
and the carvings at the entrance commissioned and erected. Professor
Kawharu was appointed Director on a two-year contract, and Dr
Dorothy Urlich Cloher appointed Assistant Director. The building
was blessed and opened by Bishop Ben Te Haara in mid-1993, at
a hui attended by over two hundred kaumatua and leaders from throughout
Taitokerau.
During the decade which followed,
the Centre occupied only the ground floor of 18 Wynyard Street.
Access to the attic, which served as a studio, storage place
for yacht sails, and playroom in the Draffin days (and probably
had similar functions in the 19th Century) has been blocked off
since the connecting staircase was removed during refurbishment,
and the basement, once the billiard room, has up to 1994 been a workshop and
storage place for taonga held and created by the Department of
Maori Studies' material culture programme. (The material culture
programme's own building, at the back of the Centre, stands on
the site of the Draffin family's garage and Mr Draffin's study
-- the latter was indeed a temporary base for the first Director
of the Centre while the house was being renovated.)
The
tour you are about to embark on, is thus for the present a tour
of just one floor of the house at 18 Wynyard Street as it was until July 2004. Since August 2004 the building has been temporarily occupied by another University department, while plans are being made for the Centre's future. The new occupants have replaced most of the taonga described below with their own artifacts.
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The University rohe, stretching
from the northernmost edge of the Waikato across to the Coromandel
peninsula, and then north to Muriwhenua, is the focus of a large map which has greeted visitors as they enter the building through the front door..
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On
the wall to the left, before you reached the reception area, was
a map of Ipipiri, the southeast section of the Bay of Islands,
with the traditional place names names identified trough the intensive
research of Murphy Shortland, a scholar of Ngati Hine, Ngati Wai
and Ngare Raumati descent, as seen below:
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On
a wall in the far distance you could see a beautiful enlarged photograph
of Sharon Heihei, representing the future generations for whom
the Centre was founded, taken on the wharf near the Kerikeri stone
store.
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were three major artworks in the Centre's conference room. Over the
mantelpiece hung a portrait of Sir
James Henare, whose vision and generosity of spirit continues
to inspire the institution named in his honour and all who have worked
in it. |
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| On
the wall opposite the magnificent handiwork of a group of Ngati
Kuri weavers under the leadership of Saana Murray has been displayed. This flax tapestry
represents the three lines of waves, ngaru nui, ngaru roa, and ngaru
pae whenua, which break incessantly on the ninety-mile beach, and
the tides which flow from Waitemata and Manukau and meet near Te
Rerenga Wairua. |
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| The far wall has been dominated by a gigantic rürü, the work of Ngati Hine artist Richland
Shortland Cooper, who donated it to the International Consortium for Experiential Learning during their conference in 2000, and whose coordinator suggested that the Centre would meet his need for a fitting place
to house this tribute to his mentor, the nationally renowned artist
Selwyn Muru of Ngati Kurï. Although some visitors are nervous of
this rürü's inquisitorial gaze, those who work here find it an especially
fitting inhabitant of the building, and a reminder of the need to
avoid being blinded by the fads of the moment: this rürü has an
unfaltering gaze, whereas the owl of Minerva flies only with the
gathering of the dusk. |
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| In
mid-2000, the Centre commissioned Richard
Cooper to design a new logo for the Centre's stationery. We
were delighted with the design which illustrates the Centre's role
in gathering, anchoring and disseminating knowledge, and the accompanying
letterhead which reflects both the Centre's origins and its functions. |
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