Life-affirming images of a world restored to balance post-Covid are at the heart of Taurite, a remarkable collaboration from haka theatre company Hawaiki Tu and kapa haka group Te Manu Huia. Achieving such balance at this time is no easy thing, and the thirty or so multi-generation contributors to the performance have deeply considered the question of what is essential to their lives and how to best communicate these matters to an audience. A post-show discussion brought several issues to the fore, sharing insight into the performance and the inspiration it offered.

A commission from Auckland Live to Hawaiki Tu, Taurite was first presented as a work in progress during Auckland Fringe. Originally taking its focus on achieving a balance between action and reaction and the question of what makes us human, Taurite won several Auckland Fringe awards for creative director Kura Te Ua and co-choreographer Edz Eramika.

Development was continuing towards a 2021 premiere but the process was interrupted by Covid Lockdowns and has subsequently pivoted around lockdown restrictions, with black face masks and social distancing incorporated into the performance, and the event shifted from the Concert Chamber into the Great Hall and online.

The gleaming floor of the Great Hall is the performance space, with a small audience seated in marked areas of the choir stalls. Singers and musicians are largely hidden within deep shadows under the balconies til the last sections of this hour-long work, their voices, taonga puoro and contemporary instruments resonating, filling, and at times eerily haunting the air or saturating it with rich harmonies. Compositions by Tuirina Wehi, Tarumai Kerehoma-Hoani and Moeahi Kerehoma have been created especially for this work.

The dancers come and go, moving noiselessly across the floor, gliding along in voluminous black trousers, with bare chests for the men and black bandeaux for the women. Initially, the dancers occupy a central diamond-shaped zone sensitively lit by Calvin Hudson, with four corners marked by slim carved pou arrayed around a large river rock at the centre, anchoring the space and adding a distinct presence to proceedings.  

Subsequently, each dancer brings their own rock into the space, moving it atop a small carpet square to a series of different configurations reminiscent of star maps, and interacting with it in a distinct personal manner. Slim bamboo sticks are wielded at times by the men in martial style, and there are sequences of challenge and defence, wariness and watchfulness. Expressive solos are a regular feature, with extraordinary expressions of grace and graciousness, meditative withdrawal, collective joy, ease and relaxation.

Throughout the hour-long work, potent symbols are activated and te ao Maori is honoured. The rocks are each distinct shapes whether sitting alone, clustered, or stacked one onto another. Like the rocks, the pou have undoubted mana whether standing spotlit or hoisted high above the men’s heads to look down on events. Projected patterns of water and leafy branches splay across the floor to bring the natural world into the space, and there is a sense of the seasons passing and time reversing. Three small children of Hawaiki Tu performers appear in critical roles, adding their own gravitas and joy to proceedings along with the love of their parents and a reminder of the significance of family and whanau. The children are central to a sequence in which they are carried to the front of the space wrapped in blankets. The blankets are unfurled then plaited by the movements of the dancers into a tight rope, a symbol of their shared whakapapa. In the final moments, all thirty performers emerge from the shadows.

Live streamed from Auckland Town Hall by Auckland Live in celebration of Te Wiki o te Reo Māori 2020, the performance was warmly received around the world with more than 1240 views in countries as widespread as Belgium and French Polynesia.

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