Exhibition
Kei runga, kei raro: As above, so below
Mitchell Manuel
28 March–4 May 2025
Kei runga, kei raro – As above, so below explores whakapapa and cultural connections between Māori and Scottish peoples.
Kei runga, kei raro – As above, so below explores whakapapa and cultural connections between Māori and Scottish peoples.
Mitchell Manuel’s (Kuki Airani – Ngāti Apai, Ngāti To’ora, Ngāti Taraare; Scottish (Clan Brown); Portugese; Tahitian) digital works draw on the visual symbolism of Scottish tartans, Māori motifs, and Cook Islands tīivaevae. By re-imagining tartans, deconstructing and reconstructing koru forms, and manipulating colour, design, and perspective, Manuel creates works that reflect evolving identities forged through historic encounters and generations of cultural exchange.
These works explore similarities between Māori and Scottish experiences of colonisation. However, the tension between the linear structure of tartan and the organic flow of koru also speaks to the complexity of these histories, particularly Scotland’s involvement in the colonisation of Aotearoa New Zealand.
The historical entanglements and parallels between Māori and Scottish symbols and their meanings provide a backdrop to Manuel’s own mixed heritage. Forging together symbols from the different threads of his genealogy, Manuel considers the complexity, beauty and uniqueness of the new identities forged from a variety of original encounters passed down and expanded throughout generations.
Below: Mitchell Manuel, Porotaka (Mandala) MacLeod Tartan, 2022
Above: Mitchell Manuel, Te Potai (Helmet) Campbell Tartan, 2022
