Artist Graham Tipene’s giant korowai for Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tāmaki unfurled

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Tā moko artist Graham Tipene has designed the 35m long printed wrap that will adorn Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tāmaki while it undergoes roof repairs. Photo / Michael Craig

An enormous public art work has enveloped Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tāmaki.

Six giant panels - eight metres high and a total 35 metres across - have been added to the shrink wrap currently shrouding the heritage side of the building.

The panels will flank Wellesley St East for at least a year while the gallery undergoes earthquake strengthening and has its original slate roof replaced.

Designed by artist Graham Tipene, the art work is titled Te Toi o Mangahekea and features six takarangi or interlocking spiral designs.

Tipene (Ngāti Whātua, Ngāti Kahu, Ngāti Hine, Ngāti Haua, Ngāti Manu) is a tā moko artist who has worked on multiple civic projects throughout Tāmaki Makaurau Auckland.

He says the scaffold wrap provides privacy for workers undertaking restoration work.

"So it has a function, as well as being an art work. It becomes sort of like a korowai to the art gallery."

Tipene hopes the public's first reaction to the piece that started going up at midnight on Wednesday will be "wow".

"Because ‘wow’ pulls people in. And then you get the ‘oh, I wonder what . . .?’ And that means they’re going to stare at it longer, and then they’re going to realise that each of those takarangi are different."

Tipene says the takarangi ("taka" meaning to fall and "rangi" the sky) address the cyclical life of water, from sky to lake to river to sea to sky.

"They represent male and female; Ranginui and Papatūānuku, the Waitematā and the Manukau, the two harbours surrounding the gallery and finally, east and west, the coastal waters, thereby covering the whole motu."

Each spiral contains slightly different patterns representing, variously, taniwha teeth, fish scales, Auckland's maunga and the aerodynamics of a waka stern. The surrounding kape rua kōwhaiwhai designs symbolise the passing on and transfer of visual knowledge. Curving vertical lines between the spirals refer to Te Ara Tāwhaki - the path of Tāwhaki to baskets of knowledge in the heavens - with interrupting whakarare patterns that depict disruption and change.

"This design talks to relationships," says Tipene. "Human and environmental relationships. It talks to the history of occupation, of the land itself, of the waterways."

The new art work cost approximately $65,000 (including manufacture, installation and artist fees) and funding came from Tātaki Auckland Unlimited's existing capital budgets.

Nathan Pōhio, Auckland Art Gallery's senior curator Māori, says the panels are a reminder to look after each other - and the environment.

". . . To sustain life, not just ourselves but for all our future generations. Tipene felt a responsibility to focus on these things due to the recent weather events that will have long-term social, environmental, and infrastructural impacts."

Tipene's previous civic projects include the Waterview tunnel, Victoria Park, Auckland War Memorial Museum Tāmaki Paenga Hira, Auckland Library, and Tirohanga Whānui Bridge in Albany.

Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tāmaki is a Category 1 listed heritage building, occupying the Kitchener and Wellesley street corner since 1887. In 2011, a $121m and multi-award winning redevelopment increased display space by 50 per cent. The heritage restoration project, dubbed "kia whakahou, kia whakaora" (to restore, to heal) began in February and will take up to two years to complete. While access to the older part of the building is closed, the gallery's new contemporary section remains open to the public every day except Christmas.

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