Koki Ake Te Oro
Koki Ake Te Oro
Koki Ake Te Oro is a long-form audio poem and performance work I created as a way to reconnect with my whenua and honour the stories of my tūpuna from Ngāti Haumia of Te Aro Pā. I wrote the text jn English and it was translated into te reo Māori by Watene Kaihau.
It began in 2023 as a self-guided, future-set walking tour for The Performance Arcade, imagining the landscape of Te Aro Pā one hundred years from now. In 2024, I developed it into a full audio performance in te reo Māori, and English, inviting both people who come to Te Aro Pā to step into a space of possibility — to imagine a future shaped by tino rangatiratanga.
This work is a hīkoi — an intentional journey — and an act of public art that asks listeners to walk, listen, and feel. It’s a way to engage with the whenua, to hear what has been buried, and to carry the stories of Ngāti Haumia into the future. Through sound, movement, and presence, I’m reclaiming space and affirming that we are still here — descendants with deep roots in this whenua and wai.
Koki Ake Te Oro is part of my wider practice as a performance artist and poet, using public space and creative storytelling to bring ancestral narratives into contemporary life.
“These visions are what tino rangatiratanga looks like in practice and what we should have had all along. They offer better outcomes for tangata whenua, tangata tiriti and te taiao. Living in the current climate, they are the hopes we must hold onto. ”