Ane Tonga's work is part of an ongoing photographic investigation that explores nifo koula (gold teeth) as a popular and relatively new form of Tongan body adornment.
As Polynesian navigators voyaged across the Pacific; in the Chinese city of Pingyao, its citizens were building walls. Some 650 years later, the two cultures will meet in the still-walled city at the world's largest photography festival.
Work by contemporary Maori and Pacific photographers travels across the ocean to join
10,000 images from all over the world at the Pingyao International Photography Festival.
They're bound to catch the eye.
It's the first time a contingent of Maori and Pacific photographers has been invited to take part and it includes a who's who of contemporary art photographers: Siliga David Setoga, Terry Koloamatangi Klavenes, Tanu Gago, Ane Tonga, Grant Apiata, Linda T, Raymond Sagapolutele, Russ Flatt, Lisa Reihana, Emily Mafile'o, Pati Solomona Tyrell and Natalie Robertson.
"I don't want to jump the gun here," says Ata Te Tangata curator Rosanna Raymond, "but I think it's also the first time a combined group of photographers of Maori and Pacific descent from Aotearoa New Zealand have joined forces for such a large show."
