Pacific Sisters (Aotearoa New Zealand)

Members: Lisa Reihana, Rosanna Raymond, Ani O’Neill, Suzanne Tamaki, Selina Haami, Niwhai Tupaea, Henzart @ Henry Ah-Foo Taripo, Feeonaa Wall, and Jaunnie ‘Ilolahia

Art Gallery of New South Wales

The Pacific Sisters is a Tāgata Moana art collective that emerged from the fringes of mainstream arts and culture in Aotearoa New Zealand in 1991. They are now celebrated for their multi-disciplinary practice that blends Moana heritage art and contemporary forms to create fashion activism. Through ceremony, art, adornment and performance, they embrace and assert their urban Māori, Pacific, and Queer identities, unique to Aotearoa New Zealand. Pacific Sisters advocate for the environment, Indigenous, POC and Queer rights and body sovereignty. The collective is an active and influential part of the wider Moana arts community, nurturing and mentoring younger artists, as well as inspiring and supporting each other’s individual art practices.

Commissioned by the Biennale of Sydney with generous support from a grant from Open Society Foundations, generous assistance from Creative New Zealand, assistance from James Roth and Susan Sue Acret and assistance from the Chartwell Charitable Trust.