Tuarima: Ritual and Religion.
Of this Place:
Kōrero with Pip Davies on what it means to be.
5/6
A peek into someone’s inner world.
A kōrero* to bring into your own world.
The following conversation took place at the end of February 2023, at AKINA Gallery in Hastings, New Zealand, Aotearoa. I sat with Pip Davies and Sacha Miriama van den Berg, and took in their stories, of what I later determined to centre around the themes of what it means to be.
Artist and Storyteller: Pip Davies
Gallery Curator and Co-Storyteller: Sacha Miriama van den Berg
As told to: Paige Kaye
Five / Tuarima
Ritual and religion
Our family has quite a strong Anglican connection, they were the first missionaries to come to New Zealand; that's why they came because they were missionaries coming to ‘educate the Maori’. And so I’ve always found that quite cringy, and I don't follow the faith. I don't have a Christian faith, I don't believe in those stories, but I do have spirituality. I know that when spirituality becomes a religion, that's when things start falling apart.
I was a Nicherin Buddhist in Auckland for a number of years. We chant, nam myoho renge kyo and it’s all about the belief that you have your power within you, that what you’re doing is feeding that power so that you will then get stronger. Your God is within. You’re getting to your God state (your buddha nature) from within, rather than it being external. And it was a personal practice, you don’t have to go to church; you don’t have to do anything rigidly.
Faith is linked to grief.
Fundamentally if you had a child die, how would you reconcile that?
You have to hope that they've got somewhere better, it’s in your grief. And the film that Ricky Gervais wrote, it was to comfort his mother, his lies came from giving comfort to someone who's dying and turned it into religion (The Invention of Lying).
We don't have a religious belief, certainly in our family, and it's a very non-religious country that we live in. That's why Matariki is so important because we've only got Easter and Christmas, both religious, yet they have no religious power. So what have we got? Hopefully we're open to new rituals that are not church-based, that are about people.
There is huge potential for being different, you know, and I've had this conversation with Sasha, because like you, you have Māori in you [Paige] and you have a right to that and you can tap back into it. Pākehā don’t. I don't have that. I have it [ritual] through my work. My personal development has been through my exploration, which has been my own personal language of making. But there are no [religious] stories that make sense to me.
And so, I'm looking at going further backwards further and going. And I started looking at these patterns because I'm going to be looking at tukituki and kowhaiwhai this year. A lot of what I’ve gathered, because I’m still yet to learn, it's about showing your genealogy in the kowhaiwhai. I’ve started just playing with patterning as I always have, but I've never used it as a literal visual language like Māori do. So I'm intrigued. And I started looking at parents who have children—every person has two parents worldwide. It's a constant. Every person has two parents, and everybody's going to die. And that's being human. And I started visualising that I am a product of two parents and they are the product of their parents.
And each line doubles. And first it was just to visualise where where countries of origin and where we are now. I was just trying to grasp all that and then I started looking at the male and the female having a symbol, so I made it so that in the square that ‘ V’ was female, I did this, it just naturally made sense because women are looking up, in support. And then men were like ‘Ʌ’ about standing and strength. And there's a difference between them, and you need both. You need to accept standing for things, but also the embracing of things, you know. And I just thought that that's beautiful.
When I visualised that it ended up being in patterns, and what it ended up having this vision of every woman is born of a woman who is born of a woman is born of a woman born of a woman…to the first Eve, you know that they can trace back to Africa, a quarter million years ago.
And that's my connection, that's my indigenous connection. It's just how far back I have to go. And there are no stories that I know that make sense to me because all the fairy tales have been so separate from their real truth. It's all about girls, being pursued by men and, you know, how does that help? Right? So we haven't been given stories that make any sense of what it is to grow up.
But you just have to go deeper. And so I just think, well, when I'm in my work, and I'm just in that place, my work flows, or when I'm looking after a body and I need to look after this little boy because he needs to go home. I'm so out of my depth here, but I must do that. That is faith.
I now see that for me, that is my ancients talking to me. There is no particular story or ritual that I can reference, but it's there and I just have to believe that it is there, and it is. And it's as powerful as anything else.
I've come around from feeling, ‘Oh, I'm just Pākehā I have nothing’ to actually ‘I have just as much, but I have to feel it.’' I can't say it. I can't see it. That if I feel it, that is enough.
It helps ground me. It just really helped to place the stories of where we are from. Of this Place, the show was really quite interesting because it was about geography to begin with, but actually it is about this, it is about community and having a right to stand. Your turanagawaewae, what you stand for.
And when you feel it, you don't have to defend it. You know, you just have to feel it. And I think as Pākehā that's what I can stand for. That's where I can stand and say, welcome, there's only communion, there is no threat, there's no fight.
Neither side has got anything to lose. So as a moment in time, I think this is really interesting. And that's why I've loved that you [Paige], suggested that you write it down. Won't it be interesting to look back and in two years time and see how prophetic this was?
You know, yeah, because I don't know if I'll ever make artwork again, it might be irrelevant. Because the work comes out of the need to do; who knows what that looks like? I might still be making things. I mean, I always have, there’s a likelihood that I still will. But I'm not attached to that. My creativity becomes different because it's now a collective response.
Monument 1.
Pigment, art grade resin
& re purposed fabric
130cm high x 57.5cm wide
Cones
Graphite, Egg Yolk, Lichen, Bearded Iris, Turmeric, Ochre
Pigment, art grade resin,re purposed fabric, stones,
clay & plywood
37cm wide, 30cm deep, 43cm high