Strong trap to catch a slippery issue

Robert Jahnke with his industrial looking rocket cum hinaki, or eel trap. Picture / Paul Estcourt

Walking into the crisp, concrete interior of Bath St you are confronted by a tower of shiny concentric stainless steel rings, rising up from the floor like some 1950s vision of a rocket ship.

On the wall three stainless steel orbs rise out of shiny steel plates with some mysterious industrial purpose.

But this is a Robert Jahnke show, so the shapes will have some other context.

The rocket becomes a hinaki or eel trap. The wall pieces become crayfish pots, exposed by the receding tide.

"I did those for a show in Wellington about the foreshore and seabed debate," says Jahnke. "They are maquettes for a proposed sculpture for the Wellington waterfront - the idea is they would stand about 2m high, while the hinaki would be 5m."

Most of Takahi Whenua, which Bath St is hosting in association with dealer Jane Sutherland, is a series of 12 wood-and-stainless pieces which can be read as stamps, survey pegs, or an older sort of tohu marking off territory. Each piece has a phrase, drawn from the Foreshore and Seabed Act 2004, which can be read in the reflective base. The fact there are 12 is a subtle reference to a jury, or to the 12 apostles - a theme Jahnke has used in earlier works.

The notions of officialdom, whether formal stamps or survey pegs, can also be a reminder that much of what is considered "traditional" actually has its origins in laws of the past or the 19th-century court battles and decisions in the Native Land Court.

"I like using text. I always play it up as a feature," Jahnke says.

He points to the tradition of text elements in Maori carving and tattooing, which emerged in the 19th century. Text features in some of the houses carved by Jahnke's maternal great-great-grandfather Riwai Takirau from the Ngati Porou stronghold of Waipiro Bay on the East Coast.

Jahnke is drawn to the big themes of the day. A 1998 show, done during an outburst of debate on Maori customary fishing rights, included bronze works with relevant text and a subtle Christian double meaning.

"It makes the works specific to a period, to a point in history. I kind of like that," Jahnke says.

He doesn't shy away from the "Maori artist" tag, but puts a twist on Ralph Hotere's assertion that while Hotere is Maori by upbringing, it is irrelevant to his artwork.

"What I have done in terms of locating the work, as far as Maori go, is locate it in issues, but the visual form that emerges in response to those issues, this could be created by a non-Maori."

This contrasts to the more "traditional" approach being taken by Gisborne's Toihoukura school.

"That is very much [Toihoukura founder] Sandy Adsett's philosophy, that for art to be called Maori it must have a visible link back to the culture. I don't believe that at all. Art can express ideas and notions relative to Maori."

Through his role as head of Maori Studies at Massey University and co-ordinator of the Maori visual arts programme on its Palmerston North campus, Jahnke serves as a bridge with the emerging generation of artists, who are moving past issues of identity, and the generation before him, the likes of Selwyn Muru, Arnold Wilson and Para Matchitt (an important early influence), who put Picasso in the pa.

While his own work is fairly formalist in its concern for materials and techniques, Jahnke pushes students to take a more conceptualist approach.

"I push them to a conceptual realisation of ideas, whether through paintings or installations.

"I encourage them that this is a new age, there are new technologies, they need to break out and explore new materials and new possibilities."

Exhibition

* What: Takahi Whenua: Stamped Earth, by Robert Jahnke
* Where and when: Bath Street Gallery, 43 Bath St, Parnell, to May 28