Australian Wood Review – June 2019

http://www.woodreview.com.au 57

University of Tasmania that carving
really took off for me.

So you studied furniture design but went
in another direction?

I was never too enthusiastic about the
idea of making furniture but
I loved the people at the university
and the access to the knowledge.
I consider myself fortunate to have
come through in the early 2000s
when Kevin Perkins and John Smith
were teaching at the university. These
people don’t arrive at the place they’re
at by accident...you’re in the shadow
of big trees, so to speak.

Did you go into a related profession after
leaving university?

By second year I was already
making and putting my work into
exhibitions, selling work and doing
commissions. It took off rather
quickly and I think that was because
I’d always been shaping.

Visually and through hashtags, some of
your work references the koru or spirals
often seen in Maori work. Why is this?

My first carvings were in bone.
Traditional Maori fish hooks (hei
matau) and hei tiki – those sorts
of things. But living outside of
Aotearoa there are so many other
experiences that have influenced my
work. Maori design is what I grew up
with and these lines are very much
instinctual, they’re in my DNA. But
as time goes on, living in Australia,
I’ve come to explore a different place,

different forms and other stories.

The Aboriginal coolamon bowl, for

example. For me, this simple form,

so absolutely useful in day to day life

of the indigenous people of this land,

is a wonderful object. A form that

speaks of connection to land.

What are you trying to say with your work?

In my work I want people to gravitate

to an understanding that they’re of

this place. That wherever you stand,

if you look after it and engage with it,

then that’s your place.

I think I’m trying to point to our

natural connection with the world

and our place within it.

I’m horrified about how we are

walking on the planet at the

moment. We need to lighten off

how we use the earth. My work

is all about trying to indicate the

Above: Hape Kiddle

cradles a Huon pine bowl

form from his Holding

Water series.

Opposite: An explorative

form in Huon pine for Hape

Kiddle’s Holding Water

series, later scorched and

wax finished.