The Veiqia Project

16 March 2016 - 26 March 2016
Gallery Three, ST Paul St Gallery
63 Wellesley Street East
AUT City Campus

Opens 6pm Tuesday 15 March

The Veiqia Project is a creative research project inspired by the practice of Fijian female tattooing. Five contemporary Fijian women artists have been engaged in Australia and New Zealand to participate in shared research activities and Museum visits to inform the development of new artwork. The Veiqia Project exhibition will take place in Auckland, New Zealand in March 2016 for the Auckland Arts Festival, and coincide with the Pacific Arts Association XII International Symposium.

At its heart, The Veiqia Project involves seven Fijian women - five artists and two curators - on a journey of artistic and cultural enquiry. Through a shared online research forum and time spent with Fijian collections at museums in Australia, Fiji and New Zealand, the artists have generated an indigenous research archive driven by personal, artistic and relational connections. The project has drawn significant support from Auckland Museum, Fiji Museum, the Fijian Art Project, practitioners, supporters, friends and family engaged both on and offline.

The Veiqia Project’s strategic alignment with the Pacific Arts Association XII International Symposium is an effort to foreground the important dynamic between indigenous artists, Museum collections, the past and the present, the ‘collected’ and the ‘collector’.

The Veiqia Project received support from Creative New Zealand Pacific Arts, and is presented in association with the Auckland Arts Festival.

^{Image credit: Image: Luisa Tora, Vorivori ni susugi tiko, 2016 (video still)}.