New videos by Rachael Rakena explore the art of eating

Exhibition runs until 13 June 2009

Technology and culture combine in a sumptuous new exhibition by Rachael Rakena ­ a leading Maori exponent of video art. This solo exhibition follows her highly acclaimed collaborations which have featured in some of the world¹s top art events including the Busan Biennale 2008, the Venice Biennale 2007 and the Sydney Biennale 2006.

The exhibition titled He Waiata Whaiaipo is, in the first instance, an examination of the cultural specificities of food. But it is also a love song in moving image employing the act of eating as a metaphor to play out ideas about desire, pursuit and fulfilment. In three different videos, a solitary and self-contained man eats mango and fishheads in a dark and watery world, which is at once sensuous and forbidding - evoking the myths of Narcissus, Maui and Hine nui Te Po. Water has been a prominent feature of Rakena's work and it surfaces again here poetically providing an amniotic medium for love and culture. Rachael Rakena, who has a Master of Fine Arts (Distinction) and is a lecturer at Toioho ki Apiti, School of Maori Studies, Massey University, has coined the term Toi Rerehiko as a means of describing and locating her practice. Toi Rerehiko, which plays on rorohiko the Maori word for computer, is a digital media art form immersed in Maori tikanga (customs) and values. A short clip from one of the videos may be viewed at: >

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