Bulls and cannibals in Tuffery's art

By LINDA HERRICK

A rare New Zealand beast is set to prowl New York City's posh Park Ave. It is artist Michel Tuffery's big tin bull, Povi Tau Vaga. There is much more to this corned-beef-can bull than meets the eye, though. The ever-playful Tuffery has converted its innards into a good-old Kiwi barbie, which he plans to fire up out on the avenue.

The bull and the barbie are pointers to Paradise Now?, a major exhibition of New Zealand artists at the Asia Society and Museum. It's a big deal; the Asia Society is a non-profit institution started 50 years ago by John D. Rockefeller 3rd to foster awareness of 30-plus countries in the Asia-Pacific region. Like him or not, US Secretary of State Colin Powell is a strong advocate of the society and its educational work.

With Tuffery, who will follow the opening ceremony on February 18 with a performance piece called Moanamalosi (Deep Blue Hue), other artists examining the concept of paradise in Aotearoa include Peter Peryer, Lisa Reihana, John Pule, John Ioane, Michael Parekowhai, Ruth Watson and Niki Hastings-McFall. The programme will feature films, lectures and symposiums, and is expected to attract a wide audience.

Meanwhile, Wellington-based Tuffery has earlier business to attend to in the form of an exhibition, Riria. Lili. Riri, in Auckland's Lane Gallery. The show comprises a series of hybrid lilies on tapa, along with double-sided paintings on tin depicting a pivotal stage in New Zealand history.

While the lilies are a tribute to his grandfather, the historical works are inspired by Tuffery's repeated readings of E.H. McCormick's book Omai: Pacific Envoy, and Anne Salmond's The Trial of the Cannibal Dog: Captain Cook in the South Seas.

Both narrate the consequences of two cultures coming together, and the impact of one culture, which assumes itself to be superior, when it imposes its values upon the other.

While the history portrayed in both books fascinates Tuffery, at this stage he is focused on two strands: the story of Omai, and Cook's introduction throughout Polynesia of breeds of "new" animals, such as cows and bulls.

Omai, from Hawaiiki then pushed out by conflict to Tahiti, was the first Polynesian to travel to England, via Cook's second Pacific voyage in 1774. While Cook described Omai as "dark, ugly and a downright blackguard", he was a sensation, touted around the upper crust as a "Noble Savage" and hosted by the likes of King George III, Samuel Johnson and Lord Sandwich, First Lord of the Admiralty.

Sir Joshua Reynolds' portrait of Omai, which sold for more than £10 million ($27 million) in 2002, has become the subject of a British Government struggle to keep it in public ownership. (The BBC screened a documentary about Omai and the portrait in its Imagine series. Although Omai's story is directly relevant to New Zealand, the documentary has never screened here.)

Tuffery has seen the Reynolds' portrait in a touring Captain Cook exhibition in Canberra. "They had huge security around the Cook paintings but none around Omai," he chortles. "I like that."

The discovery of Omai's story has linked Tuffery to his friend Tupia, a Tahitian priest who came to Aotearoa with Cook on his first voyage as a translator and became "really good mates with [Sir Joseph] Banks".

Banks gave Tupia paints to make images - "one of the first Polynesians to use European materials" - and Tupia became the witness and recorder of the arrival of the new animals which, according to Tuffery, were brought out by Cook to combat scurvy among his crew, and as an effort to diminish cannibalism.

"I'm looking at the humanity side of things and the significance of these four-legged animals turning up in Aotearoa and Maori just freaking out when they saw them," Tuffery explains.

"Cook's crew brought them over at night and hid them in tents. I've tried to imagine what it was like at that stage.

"There's a classic image reproduced in Cannibal Dog of two tents with animals inside which I've done in Dusky Sound. I'm looking for the comedy and the humanity.

"Omai and Tupia were here when it was all happening, the first Polynesians from outside Polynesia witnessing all this business. I'm trying to carry on with what Tupia would have done if he had had the materials I have now."

Tuffery, who is of Samoan, Tahitian and French descent, has long been concerned with cross-cultural interaction and this exhibition is just the start of a new direction.

"I'm buzzing out. I've set myself up for about three years to try to concentrate on these illustrations. This story is real, it is part of our history and I love it."

Tuffery hopes to team up with artist George Nuku to make a documentary about the story and travel back to the sources, including Dusky Sound and Tahiti, where his great-great-grandmother grew up in the same area as Omai's home.

Omai, incidentally, was dead in Tahiti within 18 months of his visit to England, reviled by his peers for his "big head" and robbed of his possessions. But back in England, the Noble Savage's exotic way of cooking food on a barbecue over hot stones mightily impressed the lords and ladies of England.

So when Tuffery talks about barbecues on Park Ave and life being a cycle, he's not kidding. Or then again, he probably is.

On Show

* What: Riria. Lili. Riri by Michel Tuffery

* Where: Lane Gallery

* When: Today until February 10