Our Own Image: The Legacies of Maori Filmmaking in Aotearoa/New Zealand

This project explores the pioneering generation of Maori filmmakers that began making films in the 1970s and 80s. These films, both documentaries and fiction, were the first to present film images of Maori to Maori in terms of their own world views, grounded in Maori experiences, as well as presenting aspects of life in New Zealand to a majority Pakeha culture that was, at that time, often ignorant of the lives of the indigenous population with which it shared a national space. Our research assesses their many achievements and legacies: continuities of philosophies and methods, public engagement, the diversification of media industries, questions of community and well-being, and more besides.

The project is follow-up research to work which the AHRC funded in 2006, when Stuart Murray was supported to complete his book Images of Dignity: Barry Barclay and Fourth Cinema (Huia Press: 2008), the first book-length study of a Maori filmmaker and one of the first books globally to focus on a single indigenous filmmaker. Since that initial funding, a number of that first generation have passed away: Barry Barclay in 2008 (as Images of Dignity was in production); actor/director Merata Mita in 2010; and actor/director Don Selwyn in 2007. Between them, these three figures produced arguably the most important feature films that marked the emergence of Maori cinema onto a national, and then international, stage. With its focus on legacy, this new project aligns perfectly with the AHRC's brief in its highlight/anniversary funding call. In specifically examining the impact of the first piece of funded research in the nine years that have passed since, we have a unique opportunity to discuss the legacy of a group of filmmakers that was foundational in paving the way for the now diverse world of Maori media production.

The project will be based around Barry Barclay's distinction, articulated in his 1990 book Our Own Image, between 'talking in' and 'talking out'. 'Talking in' was, in his words, "a right and responsibility for any culture to present itself to its own people in its own way". 'Talking out' involves conveying the products of this to "a world beyond" (p. 74-75). We will have two hui (gatherings or symposia), one in the UK in November 2015 and the other in Auckland in April 2016. The UK event, to be held in Leeds in conjunction with the Leeds International Film Festival and organised with the assistance of the New Zealand Studies Network, will be the opportunity to 'talk out'. It will bring together academics, filmmakers, other relevant practitioners, students and members of the public to debate the work of Barclay, Mita and Selwyn in terms of global/Fourth cinema and indigenous film. We will screen two key features, Barclay's 1987 Ngati and Mita's 1988 Mauri, which will act as the focal point of the event. The Auckland symposium, at which we will screen more films, will work through 'talking in'. We will bring together current filmmakers and other relevant practitioners , community, whanau (family) of the three directors, and representatives of the country's major film and media institutions, as well as public health experts, to discuss the impact of the legacy left by these pioneers.

Our intention is for the ideas for the second event to develop organically through the discussions of the first; the ideas of 'international' and 'indigenous' film explored in Leeds will be reconfigured in national and local contexts in Auckland, providing what will be a wide-ranging account of an overall legacy. At the same time, we will identify a number of pressing contemporary topics across both events on which each filmmaker contributed prescience and innovative vision during their careers. These are: issues of health. well-being and community; questions of settlement, belonging and ecocritical perspectives; and the archiving and guardianship surrounding intellectual property rights and the notion of 'living resources'.

Impact is central to this project, particularly the symposium in Auckland. The research undertaken in 2005/2006 began a critical discussion of the topics outlined in the summary section above, reading them in the films and film culture created from the 1970s up to that point. Changes in communications technology, an increasing Maori media workforce (the Maori Television channel launched in 2004 has contributed to this), Maori funding streams (e.g. Te Paepae Ataata (2007) and more recently He Ara) since that first piece of work have been significant, creating a different environment for Maori filmmaking.

The first period of funded research established the idea of Barclay as emblematic of a generation of Maori filmmakers that not only created images and narratives that, often for the first time, showed Maori to themselves and a majority culture in New Zealand, but also worked to revise industry structures around funding, the reception of indigenous film, whether in terms of working to find audiences within Maori communities or establishing new protocols and guidelines surrounding the depositing of material in national archives. In our proposed project here, we want to engage with a range of non-academic participants (filmmakers, filmgoers, Maori visual artists, cultural institutions) to ask specific questions about what the impact of that earlier work has been and whether its core values are still maintained in Aotearoa/New Zealand. These specifics are:

1. Film industry environment: how has this changed in the last 10 years in particular? What are the challenges to Maori film production now compared to the previous period? We will concentrate on three elements - funding, exhibition and archiving - in order to ascertain the health of current Maori filmmaking, and we will put this in the context of the wider expansion of Aotearoa/New Zealand's communications industry to include television and digital media. For example the Maori Television channel.
2. Accessibility and audience: given the importance of Barclay, Mita and Selwyn to filmmaking in Aotearoa/New Zealand, why is so difficult to see their films? We will explore the questions that govern the reception of Maori filmmaking within a national context; who is currently deciding what is valuable in terms of cultural heritage, and how are these decisions being made? Is there a belief that there is a need to communicate the legacy and impact of the first generation of Maori filmmakers to current practitioners? By asking this question of contemporary filmmakers and visual artists, we can assess the impact of some of the most important ideas that underpinned Barclay, Mita and Selwyn's work, especially around issues of self-determination. This is obviously also a question of institutional reception, and we will assess the ways in which the national Film Archive and Film Commission act as guardians of this body of work and the extent to which they are responsible for maintaining its profile.
3. Stories of self: what stories of Maori are currently being told and what do Maori want to be told? This is a crucial impact question raised by our project. Setting the foundational work of that first generation against current output is also to set the core themes of filmmakers such as Barclay and Mita - issues of self-determination, the make-up of community, attitudes towards the land, ideas of health and wellbeing, te reo Maori (Maori language) - against the narratives of today. We will ask participants to reflect on what they see as the successes of that first wave of filmmaking: what has it left to build on? What needs to change? In this way we will very specifically explore the impact the work of Barclay, Mita and Selwyn has had on the communities on which they focused.

The impact of our project will be summarised through the report (detailed in the Outputs section) we will distribute to the participants, both individual participants and institutions, in the project.