A New Vision of Rapa Nui Art – By Maitaki Losada, curator
“Tarai hō’ou, Te U’i Iŋa ‘āpi” is the new exhibition that we inaugurated at the end of July at Mana Gallery, which alludes to a new vision of Rapa Nui art. In the initial stages of the exhibition’s development, we contemplated that the artists would rely solely on Unprecedented or “rarer” pieces, far from the classic Rapa Nui iconography, such as the Mōai. However, the concept evolved to include elements from the artists’ own creative universe, also coinciding with the audiovisual material from the scientific expedition Falkor (Too) in the underwater mountain ranges of Rapa Nui and Juan Fernández, which inspired several artists in their creative process.
The final result reflects this new vision of Rapa Nui art, manifesting a twist in the carving of reproductions, where each artist contributed their authorship in a more intentional way. The artistic imprint of each piece, marked by distinctive details, combines the value of tradition with the personal vision of each creator.
In the pictorial field, there has always been more freedom, since we do not work with direct replicas; although they are used as a reference,it is not searching to replicate the piece exactly, since it is another medium. The results vary between abstractions about Rapa Nui, legends, references to pieces and the audiovisual material of the Falkor (Too) expedition , where the artists who participated in the Artist-at-Sea program were also included. This resulted in different universes encapsulated in the exhibition, which can be categorized as abstract, marine and terrestrial universes.
The process of defining a theme for the exhibitions at Mana Gallery generally begins with a meeting with Cristián Arévalo Pakarati, also known as Pájaro, who is the founder of the gallery along with Jo Anne Van Tilburg. He has served as a mentor to the group of artists we represent at the gallery, contributing his knowledge and extensive research material on the cosmovision, symbolic and artistic production of the Rapa Nui culture.
During this process, the Thematic may change; the artists themselves can contribute ideas to reach a consensus and then carry out a curatorial work developed by me. The idea is always to generate coherence among the artworks during the installing, which can be quite challenging when working on a Collective exhibition with such varied visions.
Finally, the purpose of Mana Gallery is to generate a space where the work of local artists can be exhibited, based on the tradition and preservation of Rapa Nui art, while providing new proposals and visions. In addition, the quality and authenticity of the works exhibited is guaranteed.
