New Zealand Aotearoa as we know is a land of migrants, yet we have never really figured out how to make the past few generations of migrants genuinely feel at home. Some demand assimilation – if you come here be prepared to become totally Kiwi, but what does that mean? This is just one of the questions examined in Crossing Lines, a Maori-Somali collaboration two years in the making. 

Very rarely, you experience a frisson of excitement right from the opening seconds of a play. In this massive warehouse, you first see an ever evolving videoscape of an abstract horizon while listening to a series of voices talking about the land, belonging and tangata whenua.

The lights come up and we peer into a space that feels a little scary until we are beckoned in to see the photographs and read the messages along the back wall. At this point the cast still haven’t resorted to dialogue, we don’t need to speak the same language to understand each other.

When words to come they are filled with meaning. Umilkheir Amin and Mohamed Osman bring us the Somali perspective. Matariki Whatarau and Maria Rose MacDonald, the Maori perspective. In one eloquent scene, the Somalians join a queue where the woman is initially invited to the front. But the other two get annoyed when she invites her Somalian friend to join her there. There is jostling for position, done comically yet it makes an important point. At the same time we encourage migration, we also treat them as a potential threat.

Jennifer Lal excels herself with her lighting design for the cavernous space, it is achingly beautiful at times. The directing team have worked with the four actors to produce a series of vignettes, each one potent and resonant.

This production comes directly from the heart, and you will leave feeling hopeful, uplifted and excited about the future. You can’t ask for more than that. 
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Community is the essence of Crossing Lines and in particular two communities – Maori and Somalian. The production is the result of two years work involving many people from these two communities plus the artistic community of South Wellington looking at common threads between the two and examining the challenges each face. 

There is also an exhibition in the same space open during the day for the duration which is part of Crossing Lines.

For the performance the audience is seated along one wall of a large warehouse in Cable Street facing large white screens. As the lights go down an evocative soundscape begins and images appear on the screen. 

Voice overs are heard, though some lack clarity, explaining the tangata whenua’s place in this land. Then the screens roll up exposing the large warehouse and the exhibition space where a Maori woman (Maria Rose MacDonald) lets sand run through her fingers and Maori man (Matariki Whatarau) plays with a large stick while a Somali woman (Umilkheir Amin) sits at a laptop and a Somali man (Mohammed Osman) climbs the back wall. 

Eventually the audience is invited through the exhibition space, where there are many pictures and drawings from those who have participated in the project, to the performance space.

Here the audience is invited to sit once again, to “make yourself at home” as “there is plenty of room for everyone” the irony of which is not lost on many in the audience.

Then the four actors, confidently and with a sense of purpose and commitment, describe their cultures and how they have each assimilated into the NZ way of life. Initially the Maori pair appears to be the dominant group, with the Somalain’s standing back watching subserviently. But then in a delightfully comic scene, they take over, much to the surprise of the Maori pair. 

From their orations we learn that the Somali culture and tribalism is very akin to that of the Maori. The production then becomes very physical the two groups confronting each other, verbally and physically, for dominance of the space. But then handshakes all around and integration, which the audience is told, is “being who you are and sharing it.” 

The Somalis also make the point that if they had been taken to a marae rather than the Mangere Refugee Reception Centre life could have been a lot easier for them.

Thus ends the production with a chance to meet the cast over a cup of tea in another part of the warehouse, the Home space, completing a fascinating piece of performance art that is engaging, provocative yet information and entertaining. 
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For more production details, click on the title above. Go to Home page to see other Reviews, recent Comments and Forum postings (under Chat Back), and News.   

Copyright © in the review belongs to the reviewer

For more production details, click on the title above. Go to Home page to see other Reviews, recent Comments and Forum postings (under Chat Back), and News.   

Copyright © in the review belongs to the reviewer