FIJI TIMES // an exhibition curated by Ema Tavola

Title: For Fiji, Ever Fiji
Year: 2009
Dimensions: 210 x 170cm
Medium: Mixed media on canvas

ARTIST STATEMENT

Glossy postcard ideals

With Turquoise blue

Stark white beds offering smiles

As Camouflaged eyes watch

A heavy hand waves the flag of hope

Realities contrast

Deals unseen

As the faithful pray for truth

Songs of Tino Rangatiranga humm across the ocean

As we watch from the outside in

Snuffed voices and severed limbs

Monitored,

Bound,

To the shape shifter wanting sovereignty

This work is for the love of a land rich in culture, a land that is complex with nationalities and beliefs, this is for the islands of warmth and smiles, this is for the hope that Fiji finds a way.

For those of us of Fiji Diaspora we have a voice for those in Fiji there is no reprieve – question and you will be beaten

March the streets Fiji

Rise up

Say what you need to say

There will be a better Fiji

Through Freedom

This work is For Fiji, Ever Fiji.

Mau Tonu ( hold fast)

Lalaga (freedom)

BIO

Margaret Aull has paternal links to Fiji and is inspired by both her Fijian and Maori (Te Rarawa, Tuwharetoa) heritage. Margaret received a Bachelor of Media Arts from Waikato Institute of Technology in 2006. She has exhibited extensively in New Zealand since 2005 and most recently held her first solo exhibition entitled Na Kena Yali at Arts Post, Hamilton. Margaret works as the National Arts Registrar at Te Wananga o Aotearoa in Te Awamutu.

RECENT WORK

Ko au from Beulah Land (2009) first shown in For Fiji, Ever Fiji at Fresh Gallery Otara (January/February 2009)

Detail

Work from Margaret’s first solo exhibition, Na Kena Yali at Arts Post, Hamilton (2008). This piece was later shown at VASU: Pacific Women of Power in Suva, Fiji.