Wāhine Exhibition - Rotorua

Weaving together intimate sound stories and powerful portrait photography, Wāhine is an immersive multi-media arts exhibition that amplifies Māori women’s voices around Aotearoa.

Wāhine offers communities an opportunity to come together, to be enriched and inspired by these raw, honest and vulnerable stories – stories that touch on the joys and inspirations, the troubles and tribulations, and the resilience that has moulded these wāhine into the women they are.

The deeply personal words of each interview are woven together from real-life recordings captured by the women themselves and accompanied by portraits taken at each woman’s home, marae, or their chosen location.

As it travels around Aotearoa, Wāhine expands at each new location, inviting a wahine from a local iwi to join the kaupapa and hold space for the other women. Here in Rotorua, Ngamoni Huata (Tūhourangi-Ngāti Wāhiao, Tūhoe, Ngāti Rangiwewehi, Ngāti Whare) is joining the kaupapa.

"I think it's the love of people, appreciating different cultures. So even though I'm proud of mine because that's who I am, this is what I am! But I'm also open to other people too. They all have their own. And it's not about right or wrong, this is just the way they do things and this is the way we do things" Ngamoni Huata.

A public workshop, ‘Wāhine - Our Stories’, will be held on the exhibition's opening day, Saturday 1 April from 2-4pm. Facilitated by the creators of Wāhine, the workshop offers a morning of storytelling and connection, drawing on the exhibition’s kaupapa and bringing in some knowledge and stories in Te Ao Māori. This free to attend workshop welcomes all (ages 16+), held in Ngā Mareikura, Whakarewarewa – The Living Māori Village.
Bookings are essential www.thewovenwomen.org/workshop

“This is one of the very few exhibitions that you experience within a lifetime that has the ability to entirely change your life” - Dr. Jay van der Reijden, PhD Archeology

Open to the public from 6 May - 1 June 2023
Open daily 9am to 4pm
Exhibition opening: 6 May at 11.30am

16+; Trigger warning required
Free exhibition