Design, carving and installation of a waharoa for Te Māra, the community garden under development at Ōtāhuhu College
Creator: Jay Mason & Malcolm McAllister and students
Artform: Carving
Timeframe: Now until opening in Nov 2022
Location: Ōtāhuhu College
What the project involves:
Project Summary
The final piece to the the community garden under development at Ōtāhuhu College was to have a carved waharoa presented and carved by our students and to invite mana whenua, our maori whanau and the wider community of Otahuhu to the unveiling.
The waharoa needs to be complete by the time of the formal opening of the garden to the wider school community and the public in November 2022. The project team are seeking funding support for the design, carving and installation.The waharoa will be carved by the whakairo students, the installation will be done by the building carpentry class and the landscaping will be done by the mara garden students. All labour will be done by school with the support of the community. Creating a large carving at the school will have several flow-on effects. It will provide a challenge for young carvers to meet; it will lay the foundation for the decoration of the school’s whare with similar large-scale pieces; and it will set a bar for other schools teaching whakairo, a subject which has only begun to be taught in the mainstream schools, and then only in a handful.
“The carving below was completed by my year 13 student Ali Hussaini this year. We will be sending this to the secondary schools whakairo art exhibition held in TePapa Wellington later this year. We are basing our waharoa on this style of whakairo with Ali leading the project. He is from Afghanistan and is our deputy head boy. His carving is of a high quality and we are very proud of his accomplishment this year.” – Jay Rawiri Mason
