Ngā Tohunga
Ngā tohunga o Ngāti Tarāwhai.
Ānaha Te Rāhui
Tohunga Whakairo
Ānaha Kepa Te Rāhui (Ānaha Matao)
Born:
Sometime in the 1820’s
Birthplace:
Te Kōutu Pa, Okataina
Whakapapa:
Mai Te Rangitakaroro me Rangipare, ko Te Rāhui tōna pāpā, ko Rangihonea tōna whāea
Ānaha Te Rāhui was a prominent leader and canoe builder of Ngāti Tarāwhai, he served as an assessor under Governor George Grey’s rūnanga system and also a claimant for Ngāti Tarāwhai in the Native Land Court.
He was an elegant speaker who was clear and concise with his claims. He spoke with integrity even when challenged by other claimants. As a carver he was skilled in his craft. He carved waka, houses and many beautirul ornate objects. He was innovative with his carvings and it was easy to differentiate his work from others for his own unique carving style.
Te Rāhui, Ānaha’s father was a prominent leader and canoe builder of Ngāti Tarāwhai at the time when Ānaha was born. His mother, Rangihonea was of Ngāti Pikiao from Rotoiti.
Ānaha and his older brother Wiremu Te Ohu grew up around Okataina. By the time Ānaha had reached his youth Te Iwimokai was now assuming leadership of Ngāti Tarāwhai and was establishing the tribe at Ruatō, on the southern shores of Lake Rotoiti. Ānaha spent time between Ruatō and with his Ngāti Pikiao family in the Rotoiti vicinity as well.
Ānaha and his family became well involved in the Christian faith during the mid 1830’s when Thomas Chapman established a mission station in the area, and he also lived at Tahunapo, an outpost of Mr Chapmans around 1838.
Living about Okataina, Ānaha cultivated many of his gardens and began learning the craft of whakairo waka from his father and other experts. The first canoe Ānaha worked on was called Te Arapaenga.
By the late 1840’s Ānaha was gradually assuming leadership amongst Ngāti Tarāwhai, he and his wife, Wahia, daughter of Te Iwimokai, moved to Te Ngae to be closer to Chapmans mission station.
Ānaha was also appointed as an assessor at Okataina under Governor George Grey’s new rūnanga system and had to give up his cultivations and gardens to spend more time on government business. He resided at Ruato and Okataina and assisted Te Waata Taranui of Ngāti Pikiao in his own government dealings.
By 1864 Ānaha had assumed leadership of Ngati Tarawhai and also led Ngāti Tarāwhai into many skirmishes for the government during the land wars. After the land wars Ānaha settled in Ruatō and whilst continuing to carve, he also became a skilled speaker in the Maori Land Court on behalf of Ngāti Tarāwhai. His claims were well thought out and concise and outlined the ancient Ngāti Tarāwhai boundaries which now make up the Okataina scenic reserve.
Ānaha participated in the carving of houses Rangitihi, which stood at Taheke, in 1867 to 1871, Tokopikowhakahau in 1877. Carvings from Rangitihi are now located in the Auckland War Memorial Museum and one panel is in St Petersburg. Ānaha worked alongside Tene Waitere and Neke Kapua, other tohunga whakairo from Ngāti Tarāwhai, in the carving of Nuku Te Apiapi and Rauru for the owner of the Geyser Hotel, Charles Nelson. Ānaha became innovative with his carving and began carving small ornate objects such as bowls, tinder boxes, tobacco boxes and more and selling them to Europeans. Auckland and Wellington Museum also commissioned his work for their displays.
Reference:
Picture: Charles Goldie, 1908
Para: Te Ara the Encyclopedia of New Zealand, Dictionary of New Zealand Biography
Carved Histories: Rotorua Ngāti Tarāwhai Woodcarving by Roger Neich
Wero Taroi
Tohunga Whakairo
Wero Taroi (Wero Mahikore, Karu and Wero)
Born:
Early 1800’s
Birthplace:
Lake Okataina
Whakapapa:
He uri nā Te Rangitakaroro me tōna hoa wahine tuatoru, Te Hinganga. Ko Mahikore tōna pāpā, Ko Marukore tōna whaea. No Ngāti Tarāwhai rāua.
Wero Taroi was born somewhere around Lake Okataina sometime in the early 1800’s.
He grew up amongst his people and learnt his craft from his older cousins, Te Amo a Tai and Tara Te Awatapu. This was a time when carving with stone adzes and chisels was changing to European introduced metals.
All carvings associated with Wero are done with metal tools. He is known as the originator of carving design and leader of carvers at the Ngāti Tarāwhai school of carving at Ruatō, on the edges of Lake Rotoiti.
He was renowned for his unique style in carving and being able to produce carvings that superimposed several layers of figures in a single composition.
Wero worked on many marae and houses for people of other tribes. Some are listed below;
Rangitihi - Te Taheke, Lake Rotoiti
Houmaitawhiti - Otaramarae, Lake Rotoiti
Hinemihi - Te Wairoa Pa, Lake Tarawera
Nuku Te Apiapi - Te whare o Arama-Karaka Mokonuiarangi- Ngati Rangitihi, Matata
Uenuku-mai-rarotonga - Punawhakareia, Rotoiti
Tiki-o-Tamamutu - Taupo
Te Puawai o Te Arawa (storehouse) - Maketu
Tokopikowhakahau - Tapapa
It is not known if there are any pictures of Wero nor where and when he died.
Eramiha Neke Kapua
Tohunga Whakairo
Born:
Sometime between 1867 and 1875
Birthplace:
Ruatō Bay, Rotoiti
Whakapapa:
Mai Te Rangitakaroro me Rangipare, ko Te Rāhui tōna pāpā, ko Rangihonea tōna whāea
Eramiha Kapua was trained from boyhood by his father in the skills and rituals of carving. At the turn of the century and with the introduction of steel tools, diversification was encouraged and the ‘Okataina School’, a group of carvers from Ngāti Tarāwhai began carving meeting houses. Eramiha’s ability in carving was very much on par with his father Neke Kapua and he assisted his father in carving many meeting houses.
Eramiha Kapua was trained from boyhood by his father in the skills and rituals of carving. At the turn of the century and with the introduction of steel tools, diversification was encouraged and the ‘Okataina School’, a group of carvers from Ngāti Tarāwhai began carving meeting houses. Eramiha’s ability in carving was very much on par with his father Neke Kapua and he assisted his father in carving many meeting houses.
Eramiha married Wairata Ngaheu and lived near Te Teko. He worked as a farmer and intermittently served on the Te Teko school committee. He was a member of the Ringatū church and was a registered minister and tohunga. For 15 years he lived a relatively quiet life amongst his wifes people in Te Teko.
Following the establishment of the School of Maori Arts at Rotorua in 1927, Apirana Ngata found that the tutors were not toki kapukapu carvers (steel adze), this was an issue in that their work lacked the flowing lines and rounded beauty of former times. So he sent Pine Taiapa to find any remaining experts in adze carving. Finally hearing about Eramiha Kapua, Taiapa was tasked with recruiting Eramiha. Whilst visiting Eramiha and his wife Wairata, it took some convincing, on part of Pine and Eramiha’s family, but Eramiha and Wairata agreed that though they were past their youth they should share their skills in not just carving, but also waiata, haka, oratory, weaving and tukutuku. In February 1930, Eramiha and Wairata began working at the carving school in Ohinemutu.
“Eramiha at once began instructing the students in the use of the adze, a practice he continued for 10 years. His pupils came from throughout the country and from Rarotonga. He taught then how to work in a smooth rhythm, often to the accompaniment of a chant or waiata. How to use the adze in a natural standing position, how to care for their tools and prepare the wood for carving; and how to use the grain of different timbers. He also told them the ancient names for different adzing techniques.
About 1940, Eramiha left the carving school but trained his nephew Te Kaka Niao Ngaheu as his successor. Our tupuna passed away on the 7th of July 1955 and was buried at Hekerangi, Te Teko.
Eramiha was the last of the Ngati Tarawhai carvers and was the last to pass on his knowledge and skills in toki kapukapu to the later generations of carvers;
“In doing so he ensured that Ngāti Tarāwhai carving styles would dominate in the resurgence of house building that resulted from Ngata’s dream that a carved house on every marae would express the continuing strength of Maoritanga”.
Ngā Whakairo:
Model pa- Araiteuru (NZ International Exhibition Christchurch 1906) & Te Whakarewarewa alongside Tene Waitere
Ruaihona – Te Teko
Tikitiki Maori Church
Ngāti Raukawa meeting house- Otaki
Centennial House – Waitangi Treaty Grounds (Northland)
Ngā Pūmanawa-e-Waru-o-Te-Arawa- Rotoiti
Tia- Te Puke
Te Poho-o-Tūhoe Pōtiki- Wamako, Waikaremoana
Tūwharetoa- Matata
Tūmatauenga- Ngati Hine Marae, Otiria
Ngāpuhi Moana Ariki- Mangamuka
Tene Waitere
Tohunga Whakairo
Born:
Sometime between 1853 and 1854
Birthplace:
Rotorua
Whakapapa:
His mother was Ani Pape, the daughter of Te Rāhui, a prominent Ngāti Tarāwhai leader.
Tene Waitere belonged to Ngāti Tarāwhai, who were kin to Ngāti Pikiao and Tūhourangi of Te Arawa of Rotorua.
His mother was Ani Pape, the daughter of Te Rāhui, a prominent Ngāti Tarāwhai leader. As a young girl, she was captured during the Ngāpuhi attack on Rotorua in 1823 and taken as a slave to North Auckland, where she was forcibly married to Waitere. Tene was born probably in 1853 or 1854 at Mangamuka.
When Tene was only a few years old an uncle brought Ani Pape and her two children back to Rotorua. They settled at Ruatō, on Lake Rotoiti, where Tene was trained as a carver by Wero Tāroi, the master carver of the Ngāti Tarāwhai school. Although Tene may have worked on some of the last big carved canoes, he established his reputation by working with Wero, Ānaha Te Rāhui and Neke Kapua on several new meeting houses around Rotorua and Taupō.
Tene married Ruihi Te Ngahue of Tūhourangi. They often lived at Te Wairoa and Te Ariki with Ruihi's people; he worked between times on houses with Wero and other Te Arawa carvers. They had one child, a daughter named Tuhipō (Rimupae). At the time of the Tarawera eruption in 1886 Tene and his family were living at Te Wairoa and were among the survivors who sheltered in the famous carved house, Hinemihi. The family were then given land at Ngāpuna and Whakarewarewa by Ngāti Wāhiao. Although times were hard, Tene managed to provide for his family through hunting, fishing and building. Later his commercial carving activity became a main source of income.
The manager of the Geyser Hotel at Whakarewarewa, Charles E. Nelson, employed Tene as a professional carver from 1892. In his workshop behind the hotel he carved big pieces to decorate the hotel and thermal areas; he also carved tobacco pipes, walking-sticks and replicas of traditional artefacts for sale to Europeans. Many distinguished visitors to Rotorua, including British royalty, were presented with his work. One major project on which he worked was the erection for Nelson of Rauru, a fully carved meeting house featuring legendary and mythical personalities chosen to illustrate the Rotorua legends that guides would tell to tourists. Rauru was sold in 1903, eventually going to the Museum für Völkerkunde in Hamburg. Nelson purchased a set of old Ngāti Tarāwhai carvings in 1904, and employed Tene and Neke Kapua to complete a new meeting house, Nuku-te-apiapi, for his tourists. Tene was commissioned to produce meeting houses for knowledgeable Europeans; he soon developed a fairly standardised small meeting house that satisfied their needs.
Tene's carvings show greater diversity than those of his contemporaries. He worked on Te Tiki-o-Tamamutu, Kearoa, Rauru, Tūhoromatakaka, Uenukukōpako, Tiki and Hinemihi. At the Whakarewarewa village he carved the gateways, some of the house named Hatupatu, a small storehouse, most of the stockade-post figures and an open octagonal lookout shelter in the thermal area. He carved massive mantelpieces in the Grand Hotel, Auckland, and the Grand Hotel, Rotorua, and a panel of relief heads, a photograph of which was used in Augustus Hamilton's book Māori art. He carved the shelter which stands over the bust of Queen Victoria at Ōhinemutu, and the ornamental gateway at Taupō waterfront.
As the commercial demand for tourist art and authentic replicas became intense in the later 1890s, Tene was by far the most prolific carver. His basic designs could be used repeatedly with slight variations to avoid the appearance of mass production.
He took the opportunity provided by European patronage to produce some of the most innovative carvings yet seen at Rotorua. This work shows the influence of European concepts of time and space, and is naturalistic in a way impossible in his more orthodox productions. Tene carved figures in oblique profiles, or sprinting across a panel, their bodies twisting in the effort of running; he also experimented with various foreshortening effects, and with narrative scenes illustrating local tribal legends. He never used such innovation in work for Māori patrons.
He ceased to carve for Europeans about 1912, and after this his work became more stylised and strictly orthodox.
Between 1902 and 1910 Tene was employed sporadically by the Department of Tourist and Health Resorts to produce carvings for the model Māori village being constructed at Whakarewarewa. In 1910 he went to Sydney with Maggie Papakura's concert party to set up a model Māori village at Clontarf and to demonstrate carving to the visitors. When, in 1927, the School of Māori Arts was established at Rotorua to train carvers and other artists, Tene Waitere was often consulted about matters of design and execution.
After the First World War Tene designed war memorials for at least two marae. His last work was the design for a monument for his own daughter, erected at the home of his grand-daughter, Rangitīaria (Guide Rangi) at Whakarewarewa. Three weeks after the unveiling of this monument, on 28 August 1931, Tene died at Rangitīaria's home. He was buried at Ngāti Tarāwhai's Ruatō burial ground. The date of Ruihi Te Ngahue's death has not been found.
According to Rangitīaria, Tene Waitere could not speak English and could neither read nor write. He joined the Ringatū faith while living at Ruatō, and later carved Tiki, the Ringatū church-house at Ōhinemutu. Tene brought up his daughter and two grand-daughters in a strict Ringatū household, observing all the correct tapu restrictions; yet he was also one of the first carvers to take some of the tapu off Māori woodcarving.
Photographs of Tene Waitere show a slight man with a drawn face, and convey the impression of a sensitive, serious personality. He did not play a major leadership role among Ngāti Tarāwhai and may have been separated from tribal concerns by his employment by Europeans, his residence at Whakarewarewa, and the circumstances of his birth. He was, however, the most prominent carver of his time in the Rotorua area. His work was steeped in tradition, and preserved its integrity when faced with the commercial demands of European tourists and collectors.