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Why I Made is a fortnightly feature in which artists and writers share the behind-the-scenes stories of their creations with listener.co.nz
You might not know her name, but chances are you’ll recognise the art Janine Williams makes.
She and her husband, Charles, are Māori urban artists responsible for some of New Zealand’s biggest and brightest murals. For 25 years, they’ve made work here, in Australia, the US and the Pacific, often featuring native flora and fauna and always honouring Māori kaupapa and design.
But Janine (Ngāti Paoa, Ngāti Whātua ki Kaipara) has done something a little different. As part of Matariki celebrations, her 9-metre high lightwork, Whai, is illuminating part of Auckland’s city centre from the Victoria St carpark building.
Inspired by Māori string games, it is set on a dark patterned background and comprises two bright blue light works. Look a little longer, and you’ll see that the top and bottom games combine to reflect the seven stars of Matariki and the background suggests our galaxy and the stars in it.
Janine Williams, why did you make Whai?
JW: As a contemporary Māori artist, making art that creates a conversation is the starting point for me, so I made Whai because I wanted to have a conversation.
Whai is universal and its design shows connection – in our communities and with our ancestors – and it also merges the old and the new. It taps into a cultural understanding that art can be the starting point for conversations about identity and belonging.
I think we’re in a really interesting period of time, where people are looking at the connection between cultural identities and art. At the same time, more research is being released about the importance of art, and public art, in particular, so I was lucky that the amazing team at Auckland Council took this onboard and allowed me to produce an artwork that enables me to speak about what’s important.
It was important to me to highlight connections, links, because what I wanted to achieve was connecting the community through art. That’s its story, that’s what I wanted to say through a really simple light work which wasn’t at all simple to create!
How did you create it?
JW: It’s a complex work of engineering and lighting expertise! I worked with a very wide team, drawing on collective knowledge and wisdom. The configuration [of stars] that has been created has four stars that sit in the bottom structure and three in the top. That’s because from a Waikato perspective, we celebrate Matariki focused on seven stars.
Have you made light works before?
JW: This is the first light work I’ve created, but I have worked quite a bit in commercial and urban design.
It’s six-storeys high so, how did you feel when you saw it?
JW: We paint murals on to buildings so I’m used to scale; it feels comfortable to me. The moment I really enjoyed was when the hanging of the light structure started, and it became three-dimensional. Whai isn’t just the light work, but also the design behind it. The point of having it offset from the wall was to create shadow on to a billboard, a dark space like you have in space, with points of light looking like other stars.
The original idea was for a large, permanent public artwork, but that got shifted to a semi-permanent option with the opportunity to move to different locations. It isn’t finished yet…
What more is there to do?
JW: I should rephrase that; it isn’t finished in my mind! There is the opportunity for it to travel to different locations, to redesign it, to change the colours and to turn it into a more complex visual statement.
Did you play string games as a child?
JW: Yes, there was actually a book that was shared back in the1980s at primary school [in South Auckland]. That was where a lot of us got ideas from; there were so many different variations.
Do your kids play string games?
JW: They do now! It’s been great to get them off their devices. We handed out string to people when Whai was launched and everybody was learning the string games and playing, just there on the street. It was a hoot; everybody was having so much fun.
Whai is brought to Matariki ki te Manawa by Auckland Council in partnership with Janine Williams and is on display until September.
