Northart is honoured to present a significant exhibition of contemporary art by emerging Pacific artists for our final exhibition of 2022. Curated by Sefton Rani, [Windows into] Modern Pacific Art brings together the work of twelve artists, aiming to present a snapshot of the breadth and depth of Pacific Art being created in Aotearoa | New Zealand today.

In [Windows into] Modern Pacific Art, twelve Pasifika artists practicing in Aotearoa | New Zealand are brought together to provide a snapshot of some of the directions in “Contemporary Pacific Art”. These are intriguing windows into the artists’ practices. The show’s essence is of the moana and is deliberately placed on the North Shore of Auckland to make a statement that we are here and that Aotearoa is also a Pacific Island.

Aotearoa | New Zealand leads the world in the creation of “Modern Pacific Art”, a broad term used to describe artists increasingly born away from their family’s original homelands or who have moved away from their birthplace to mesh into a foreign urban landscape. With this separation comes disconnect from culture, from land, from place, from language, from families, from experiences, from stories and trajectory. This loss is compounded by the values, influences, and attractions (or distractions) found in the new environment.