Kura Te Ua is leading a new movement in Māori performing arts through her high school-based haka-theatre program Auataia. The veteran haka performer, dancer and arts innovator talks to Te Kuru o te Marama Dewes about creating spaces for rangatahi Māori to excel.
Performing arts is an essential vehicle for Māori culture, embodying tribal narratives, intergenerational knowledge and identity. The physical expression of kapa haka is cultural, as opposed to performative, with rich genealogy that stretches back through Te Moana Nui a Kiwa.
The evolution of kapa haka over time has been acknowledged this year with the 50th anniversary of Te Matatini, which pushes Māori performing arts forward, keeping it relevant and enabling growth through competition.
Māori performing arts are in good health and more popular than ever, while the last two decades have seen the growing influence of haka within theatre, a natural transition being driven by leaders with a background in kapa haka.
One of those leaders is Kura Te Ua, from Te Rarawa, Te Aupōuri, Te Aitanga a Māhaki, Te Whakatōhea and Tūhoe, who is pushing the boundaries of Māori performing arts in the theatre space with a genre she refers to as haka-theatre.
Te Ua grew up immersed in kapa haka and was, “that 3 year-old child making a piupiu out of newspaper, dreaming and singing songs, creating poi out of socks… right from a young age I always knew I loved Māori performing arts.”
With 20 years under her tīpare as a performer with kapa haka groups Te Manu Huia and Te Waka Huia, Kura Te Ua is a seasoned practitioner and has learnt from the best.
“Koro Ngapo Wehi, my mentor of all leaders in my life, he spoke about ihi as being expressed through pūkana and wiri and that when you express ihi, the audience feel wehi. He says when the audience sits on the edge of their seats, when they break a sweat or get goose bumps, they feel your ihi which transmits into wehi. Between us we create an orb called wana. You can feel it. It’s energy and vibration,” says Te Ua.
She attributes kapa haka as the training ground for her work in theatre.
“Each item requires a different aspect of creative expression and you learn how to express that appropriately. That comes with having an understanding of te reo Māori. I wasn’t fluent but kapa haka has enabled me to be connected to my ao Māori,” she ways.
After training and performing in dance with Māori and non-Māori companies, she felt that there wasn’t a place that reflected who she was and what she wanted – Te Reo me ōna tikanga.
“I don’t do well with boxes”
Hawaiki Tū was born from that desire to create a platform for kaihaka, “To be able to practise tikanga Māori in our whare, to be able to tell our stories in a way that is truthful to us,” says Te Ua.
The haka-dance theatre has gone from strength to strength since its inception over 10 years ago and has twice ventured to the Pacific Arts Festival. One aspect that drives her passion is having the creative freedom that theatre allows.
“In haka there seems to be square boxes and Hawaiki Tū was created because I don’t do well with boxes. I think they’re good parameters but I like to see what is outside of that box,” says Te Ua.
After a break due to the pandemic, the Hawaiki Tū academy has now been reignited. That’s where Te Ua trains people through her knowledge and experience and brings performers into the company.
“In that whare, if you have a very strong desire, it doesn’t matter if you’re not the best at haka, yes that helps… but I would rather take somebody who knows who they are, where they are and understands the journey of Māori performing arts, over someone who is a trained dancer. I would rather have someone who is moldable,” says Te Ua.
Although not classically trained, Te Ua has a background in ballet which she acknowledges as having influenced her style along with haka and mau rākau.
She recently toured America as a dancer with the renowned Black Grace dance theatre company under founder and director Neil Ieremia who has sustained his program for nearly 30 years. The relationship came about when Te Ua approached Ieremia to check out Hawaiki Tū. “Hawaiki Tū reminded him of why Black Grace started in 2004. Here are these passionate Māori, tikanga underpinning everything, the stories were just oozing through. I think he was blown away and hopeful for the future of dance in Aotearoa,” says Te Ua.
Black Grace is currently touring their show in Aotearoa, while Hawaiki Tū prepares for their own performances of Taurite in December. Te Ua is determined to continue to build Hawaiki Tū as the vehicle that can show rangatahi Māori what haka-theatre is and the opportunities that are out there. Another way she is doing that is through a new secondary school haka-theatre production called Auataia.
Parents, aunties and uncles watching kids transform
While working as Kaiarataki Māori at Auckland Live over the last two years, Te Ua launched her long-held dream for youth event Autaia, which aims to enable rangatahi Māori to express themselves through haka theatre.
Three schools took up the challenge in 2021, with Te Kura Kaupapa Māori o Hoani Waititi, Te Kura Kaupapa Māori o Te Kōtuku and Ngā Puna o Waiorea each creating their own thirty-minute haka-theatre productions.
Experts in Māori theatre, from movement and dance to sound and lighting, supported the schools over six weeks to prepare their performances which were held at Kiri Te Kanawa Theatre at the Aotea Centre in Tāmaki Makaurau, the largest theatre of its kind in Aotearoa.
“It was so special to see a theatre full of Māori, parents and aunties and uncles, watching these kids transform. When I started with these kids, some of them, their heads were down… and I saw myself in them. Together with this mentor group we helped them stand up [and present] their performances with light and sound,” says Te Ua.
This year there are eight schools on board for Autaia. Five out of the eight are piloting the Te Ao Haka NCEA program, where students can gain credits for Māori performing arts, recognising the cultural transformation and learning that take place.
With a team of twenty experts this year, including directors and lighting and sound specialists, Te Ua says the productions are helping to bridge departments within schools to work together and enable the curriculum to recognise the value for students. “We’ve created an education resource where they can get credits in Te Ao Haka, Te Reo Māori and dance and theatre. It’s all good to create a show but if it [isn’t recognised as learning] it’s going to be hard, so that’s a really cool thing,” says Te Ua.
Twenty-eight schools have been invited to watch dress-rehearsal performances, which Te Ua says is about rangatahi being able to see themselves reflected in theatre.
Te Ua aims to share Autaia regionally and then nationally for the benefit of all schools.
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