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Emily Parr, Tongatapu (Full Moon), 2019 and Tauranga Moana (Dusk), 2021
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TitleEmily Parr, Tongatapu (Full Moon), 2019 and Tauranga Moana (Dusk), 2021
DescriptionEmily Parr
Ngāi Te Rangi, Moana, Pākehā
Tongatapu (Full Moon), 2019, Photographic print, UC-APC-1325, University of Canterbury Art Collection
Tauranga Moana (Dusk), 2021, Photographic print, UC-APC-1325, University of Canterbury Art Collection
35mm film (digital scan)
Courtesy of the University of Canterbury Art Collection
“You see, it is not just the whales who, for generations upon generations, have followed these ancient oceanic pathways and formed webs of relations between fixed points. These are my ancestral legacies, too.” - Emily Parr
During Emily Parr’s Masters research at AUT University, she reconnected with her ancestral homelands on haerenga to Samoa, Tonga, and Tauranga Moana. Though, it might be more accurate to say that she reconnected with her ancestral homewaters.
Parr describes herself as a descendent of settler-indigenous relationships across Te Moana-nui-a-Kiwa. The journeys of her European male ancestors have been well documented but the stories of the women they married when they reached the pacific are largely unknown. In an effort to get to know the indigenous women Parr descends from, she returned to their waters, traversing Te Moana-nui-a-Kiwa as her ancestors did for generations.
While on this haerenga, Parr retraced these migration lines of her ancestors. In doing so, Parr also traced the migration of paikea, southern humpback whales, that travel from Antarctica along the eastern coast of Aotearoa New Zealand to reach the warm waters of the Pacific to breed. Parr’s whakapapa is tied to these whales through an ancestor she shares with Ngāi Tahu, Paikea, who was known for riding a humpback whale.
To capture these layers of whakapapa and connection, Parr used film photography because of its ability to capture wairua when the image is made from the traces light leaves on a negative. In these photographs Parr shows us a view of Te Moana-nui-a-Kiwa, the Pacific Ocean, as a space that connects islands and people rather than isolating them from each other.
Glossary for Māori Terms
Te Moana-nui-a-Kiwa – the Pacific Ocean
Haeranga – journeys
Whakapapa - genealogy
Wairua – spiritDateJune 2024SourceSelwyn District CouncilPhotographerJohn Collie
DescriptionEmily Parr Ngāi Te Rangi, Moana, Pākehā
Tongatapu (Full Moon), 2019, Photographic print, UC-APC-1325, University of Canterbury Art Collection
Tauranga Moana (Dusk), 2021, Photographic print, UC-APC-1325, University of Canterbury Art Collection
35mm film (digital scan)
Courtesy of the University of Canterbury Art Collection
“You see, it is not just the whales who, for generations upon generations, have followed these ancient oceanic pathways and formed webs of relations between fixed points. These are my ancestral legacies, too.” - Emily Parr
During Emily Parr’s Masters research at AUT University, she reconnected with her ancestral homelands on haerenga to Samoa, Tonga, and Tauranga Moana. Though, it might be more accurate to say that she reconnected with her ancestral homewaters.
Parr describes herself as a descendent of settler-indigenous relationships across Te Moana-nui-a-Kiwa. The journeys of her European male ancestors have been well documented but the stories of the women they married when they reached the pacific are largely unknown. In an effort to get to know the indigenous women Parr descends from, she returned to their waters, traversing Te Moana-nui-a-Kiwa as her ancestors did for generations.
While on this haerenga, Parr retraced these migration lines of her ancestors. In doing so, Parr also traced the migration of paikea, southern humpback whales, that travel from Antarctica along the eastern coast of Aotearoa New Zealand to reach the warm waters of the Pacific to breed. Parr’s whakapapa is tied to these whales through an ancestor she shares with Ngāi Tahu, Paikea, who was known for riding a humpback whale.
To capture these layers of whakapapa and connection, Parr used film photography because of its ability to capture wairua when the image is made from the traces light leaves on a negative. In these photographs Parr shows us a view of Te Moana-nui-a-Kiwa, the Pacific Ocean, as a space that connects islands and people rather than isolating them from each other.
Glossary for Māori Terms
Te Moana-nui-a-Kiwa – the Pacific Ocean
Haeranga – journeys
Whakapapa - genealogy
Wairua – spirit
DateJune 2024SourceSelwyn District CouncilPhotographerJohn CollieConnections
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Emily Parr, Tongatapu (Full Moon), 2019 and Tauranga Moana (Dusk), 2021 (June 2024). Selwyn Stories, accessed 28/03/2025, https://selwynstories.selwynlibraries.co.nz/nodes/view/6724
