Fulbright New Zealand and Creative New Zealand invite applications for the 2010 Fulbright-Creative New Zealand Pacific Writer’s Residency, an award which offers a New Zealand writer of Pacific heritage the opportunity to work for three months on a creative writing project exploring Pacific identity, culture or history at the University of Hawai‘i. Valued at NZ$30,000, the residency includes return airfares to Hawai‘i, accommodation costs and a monthly stipend. It is open to writers across all genres, including fiction and non-fiction authors, poets and playwrights. Previous recipients have included children’s author Sarona Aiono-Iosefa, poet Tusiata Avia, playwright Victor Rodger and filmmakers Sima Urale and Toa Fraser. The three month residency is available from August to November 2010. The closing date for applications is Thursday 1 April 2010. See http://www.fulbright.org.nz/awards/nz-cnz.html for detailed information. Enquiries should go to Felicity Birch at Creative New Zealand – felicity.birch@creativenz.govt.nz or phone (04) 498 0735.
 This year’s Ten Pacific Festival introduces a brand new Pecha Kucha ™ night featuring significant Pasifika artists who originate from Christchurch. Among the confirmed participants are Anton Carter also known as Antsman of Rhombus and The Nomad, Pacific art historian Stephanie Oberg, writer and poet Tusiata Avia, actor and filmmaker Barbara Carpenter, and playwright Victor Rodger. The event will be held at the Dux de Lux on Thursday 4 February from 7.00pm. The Pecha Kucha is immediately followed by a Mark Vanilau concert at the same venue. Mark has a long history with the festival which started with Tribalincs, a five piece soul jazz fusion group. In 2006 when Mark embarked on a solo career, he toured as Dave Dobbyn’s keyboardist, vocalist, and still tours with him today. Mark will also join Anton Carter on Friday 4 February at 6pm for a Songmakers and Creative NZ workshop, before local reggae band D’sendantz and jazz artists K.T.O take to the stage from 8.30pm until late. The Ten Festival is organised by Christchurch’s Pacific Underground.
In its efforts to support the development of more skilled arts practitioners, Creative New Zealand is looking to contract a suitably qualified training provider to plan and provide a short course for up to 22 arts practitioners. The course is to provide New Zealand arts practitioners with opportunities to gain knowledge and develop the skills required to successfully organise the touring of performing art works and writers within New Zealand. Creative New Zealand is also interested in hearing from suitably qualified and experienced New Zealand arts practitioners who can contribute to such a course as a tutor or mentor. After completing the course trainees will be expected to develop the skills and knowledge required for successful touring within New Zealand and take account of the cultural needs and perspectives of practitioners with a focus on touring works by Maori and New Zealand Pacific artists. Interested parties are invited to submit a written expression of interest to Creative New Zealand by no later than 5 pm on Friday 18 December 2009. For more details, contact John McDavitt by email at john.mcdavitt@creativenz.govt.nz or by phone on (04) 498 0736.
 Christchurch poets, Fiona Farrell, Bernadette Hall, Ben Brown, Jim Norcliffe, Danielle O’Halloran, and Tusiata Avia are coming together to support the Samoan tsunami relief effort. Their one off show will be MC-ed by prominent Christchurch playwright, Victor Rodger, on Thursday 5 November, 5.30pm, at the Madras Café Bookshop, 135 Madras Street. Tickets will be available at the door for $10. All proceeds will go to the Samoa tsunami relief effort.
(Tusiata Avia. Image from the Aotearoa New Zealand Poetry Sound Archive.)
 ART (Arts Regional Trust | Te Taumata Toi-a-Iwi) and The Big Idea | Te Aria Nui warmly invites interested individuals to attend a unique, forum, expo and networking event: “Survive & Thrive: sustaining creative projects, organisations and businesses in challenging economic times.” Participants will hear from leading creative entrepreneurs, their success stories, and their views on present and future opportunities. The forum presents an opportunity to connect with peers and other influential people from a variety of backgrounds and sectors. Organisations that are the supporters, motivators and the backbone of the Auckland region’s creative sector will be on hand to help artists, producers, makers and doers to deliver. Entry is free. However, places are limited, so registration is essential. Contact details: RSVP to margaret.lewis@thebigidea.co.nz by 2 November with each person’s name, email, creative discipline and whether you require lunch.
- When: Monday 9 November 2009 – 11.00 am – 4.00 pm (expo, networking and lunch from 11am, forum starts at 1pm)
 Artists have come together to organise an Art Auction in aid of victims of the recent tsunami in Samoa and Tonga. The auction on Tuesday 20th of October 2009 at Webb’s in Newmarket features more than 70 pieces of art from some of New Zealand’s most renowned artists. This artist-initiated project is being coordinated through the Tautai Contemporary Pacific Arts Trust. Works have been promised from Lonnie Hutchinson, Niki Hastings-McFall, John Ioane, Suzanne Tamaki, Fatu Feu’u, Edith Amituanai, Jim Vivieaere, Johnny Penisula, Michael Hight, Sopolemalama Filipe Tohi, Deborah Crowe, Chris Charteris, Tracey Tawhiao, Nathan Pohio, and many more. Also included is an eclectic mix of novel works which include signed memorabilia of Bro’Town, a T-shirt and CD package from King Kapisi, a DVD package of Sima Urale films, a photographic series by Steven Ball, as well as book packages from writers. The event also features live performances by dancers, musicians and poets. The auction is at Webb’s auction house, 18 Manukau Rd, Newmarket from 6 pm. Viewing times are from 9 am – 6 pm. The catalogue can be viewed at www.webbs.co.nz.
(“Masina” by Edith Amituanai (2008). A2 Giclee museum quality print. 420mm x 580mm. Image from the Webbs Auction website.)
 Waitakere City poets Selina Tusitala Marsh, Serie Barford and Doug Poole speak to the art of “Spirit of the People” on Wednesday 16 September 2009 at the Okaioceanikart Gallery. “Spirit of the People” is significant because it is the first exhibition of Contemporary Melanesian art with a regional wide focus to show in Auckland. Inspired by a visit to writers in the Solomon Islands and then blown away by the colourful bold Papua New Guinea paintings at Okaioceankart, Selina Tusitala Marsh wanted to write poetry to honour her fellow Melanesian artists. Together with Serie Barford and Doug Poole, all three of Samoan heritage, the reading will create a ‘spacific’ oceanic dimension to the show. “Spirit of the People” features contemporary art from Fiji, Papua New Guinea, New Caledonia, Solomon Islands and Vanuatu, as well as work by artists from the Melanesian diasporic Pacific communities in Australia and New Zealand. The Artspeak evening starts at 7pm at the Corban Estate Arts Centre, Mt Lebanon Drive, Henderson. The “Spirit of the People” exhibition continues at the same venue until 27th September 2009.
(Image courtesy of Okaioceanikart Gallery)
Niuean playwright Arnette Arapai’s new 10 minute theatre piece “Tangimama’s 21st” is a feature of Victoria University’s “Writers on Mondays” programme for 2009. “Writers on Mondays” is organised by the International Institute of Modern Letters to showcase writers who are active in and around Wellington, as well as guests from overseas. The month of September is dedicated to an exciting and varied line-up of writers for screen, page and stage. These writers of the future are currently enrolled in the prestigious Masters of Creative Writing (Scriptwriting stream). Arnette Arapai is the only Pasifika student currently enrolled in the course. Her piece shows at the Te Papa Museum Marae (Level 4 of the museum) in Wellington on Monday 28th September 2009, from 12.15pm to 1.15pm. Free entry.
 Artists Shigeyuki Kihara and Rosanna Raymond have received the honour to exhibit their work at the October Gallery in London. The exhibition is titled “ethKnowcentrix – Museums Inside the Artist” and will run from 10 September to 10 October 2009. Kihara is a multimedia and performance artist of Samoan and Japanese descent who uses photography to explore themes of representation, spirituality, performativity, and gender. In 2008, she held a solo exhibition at New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art and won the distinction of having her work acquired by the museum for its permanent collection. She is the current Artist in Residence at the Campbelltown Arts Centre in Sydney. Raymond is a poet, performer, costume designer, dancer, and jewellery-maker, and curator. She is of Samoan and Pakeha descent and was a founding member of the acclaimed art collective Pacific Sisters. She was co-curator and artistic director of the Pasifika Styles festival in Cambridge (England) between 2006 and 2008. In “ethKnowcentrix”, she continues her exploration of the Pacific dusky maiden motif. Using poetry, performance, costume, body adornment, film and photography, the work produces a resounding celebration of the Pacific female spirit. Exhibiting with Kihara and Raymond are George Nuku, an internationally celebrated Maori sculptor and multimedia artist, and Lisa Reihana a Maori artist who comments on gender politics, cultural agency and museological interventions, through film and multimedia art. An Artists’ Forum, an Artists’ Talk, and a Poroporoaki (farewell) have been scheduled for 12 September 2009, 10 am – 7.30 pm (£15/£10 conc); 15th September 2009, 6.30 pm (free); and 10th October 2009, 3 pm (free) respectively.
Alistair Campbell, the celebrated Cook Islands and New Zealand poet, playwright and novelist has died, aged 84. Campbell was born in Rarotonga in 1925, shifting to live in a Dunedin orphanage at the age of eight after his parents died. As a young man, Campbell moved to Wellington where he joined the Wellington Group, writing alongside the likes of James K Baxter, Louis Johnson and W. H. Oliver. He had early success with his first book Mine Eyes Dazzle in 1950. In 1961 he wrote a novel for children The Happy Summer before writing a series of six plays for radio. The best-known of them was Bough Breaks (1970), which was later turned into a stage version and published in McNaughton’s Contemporary New Zealand Plays in 1974. He tutored creative writing nationally and internationally, and was president of the writers’ organisation, PEN, for a year. In 1997, Campbell was awarded the Pacific Islands Artist’s Award and in 1999, he received an honorary doctorate in literature from Victoria University of Wellington. He received the Prime Minister’s Award for Literary Achievement for poetry in 2005 and was made an Officer of the New Zealand Order of Merit in the same year. (Content adapted from One News).
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