ARTS
by Kristine Walsh
RON Te Kawa reckons that people don’t spend quite enough time counting their blessings.
Life, he says, should be a celebration — a riot of colour, a grab-bag of good times.
That could be why, on the day The Guide dropped in, Te Kawa was sporting a blisteringly orange hessian hat and a fabulously-floral vintage towelling shirt. And it is certainly why he has chosen to name his new shop-cum-studio My Beautiful life.
“We have so much to be grateful for but it’s too easy to focus on the negative things . . . I don’t think we say positive things enough,” he says, rearranging the cacophony of reworked vintage garments crammed into his chaotic Kaiti shop.
“This is just my way of saying it. Life! It’s beautiful!” One thing Te Kawa has to be grateful for is that he moved back to his hometown of Gisborne in May, keeping him well clear of the catastrophic earthquake in Christchurch, where he has lived in recent years. “I would have been okay if I’d stayed. My crusty old house was one of the only ones that wasn’t even touched,” he said. “But I’d come up here to work with Tawera (Tahuri) at her gallery and I just fell in love with the place all over again.”
An artist/fashion designer with a bent for politically charged costumery, Te Kawa opened My Beautiful Life six weeks ago and isdeveloping it into an active artspace.
By the weekend he will have painted the side room that will serve as a studio for the workshops he plans to do.
(In the past he has done everything from teaching kids how to transfer graffiti art to garments, to helping Wellingtonrefugees express their ideas about freedom via textile art.)
That is why he is on the list of more than a dozen local artists who will this weekend open their studios as part of the inaugural Creative Tairawhiti October Arts Month.
Painters, printmakers, potters, jewellers, textile artists and more have agreed to throw open their doors to offer members of the public an insider’s view of what goes on in a creative space.
“It will be a wonderful opportunity for people to discover the creative talents of locals around the district and enjoy a cruisy Sunday browsing the studio trail,” said Darnelle Timbs, of Creative Tairawhiti. Arts Month is designed to be a city-wide celebration of Tairawhiti arts and culture that also incorporates visual arts shows, music performances and other creative endeavours, she added. “Basically, we want to maximise the exposure of our local arts and cultural sector and get as many people from the community as possible involved. “Overall, the aim is to support and aid the development of arts and culture in our region, for the good of business and the community at large.”
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