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None of the events pictured are going ahead. (Image Design: Tina Tiller)
None of the events pictured are going ahead. (Image Design: Tina Tiller)

OPINIONSocietyJanuary 25, 2022

After two years of hurt, can live arts recover from red?

None of the events pictured are going ahead. (Image Design: Tina Tiller)
None of the events pictured are going ahead. (Image Design: Tina Tiller)

This latest shift into red could be the last for many artists, writes Sam Brooks.

I had the good fortune to be out of phone service when the push notifications came through. I also had the good fortune to get into a friend’s car and have them ask warmly, but with resignation:

“Have you heard the news?”

This friend, like myself, works in the arts. The kind of arts that require many people to be in the same room. The kind of arts that put both artists and audiences in the line of fire for a virus that wants to be shared more than any experience does. The kind of arts that can exist in a time of Covid-19, but not thrive.

There was only one piece of news it could be.

“Red light at 11.59 tonight.”

The sad thing is that we were expecting it. The word “red” had already become a dirty word by the start of the new year: a sentence that started “If we go into red…” didn’t need to be finished. If we, the nation, went into red then a show that needed more than 100 people in a room to break even would have weeks, months, maybe even years of planning cut down in an instant. Red is a lockdown that only applies to people who make their living from the arts.

We spent the next two hours driving home to Auckland. As we came back into service, the messages started drifting in on the phone: “We’re fucked”, “How was the last event you’ll attend this year?”, “[Name of event] cancelling!”, “[Name of event] cancelled!”. 

In the car, we talked about friends who would be caught out. Friends who were two weeks into a six-week gig and didn’t have a job come 11.59pm; friends who had planned festivals for months and years; friends who don’t just rely on the arts for a pay cheque, but a sense of purpose.

These conversations aren’t going to stop anytime soon. The longer we stay at red, the more cancellations we’ll have. Behind every cancellation, though, are artists whose livelihoods have been ripped away from them. Take Auckland Pride Festival, among the first events to cancel. Eighty events wiped out by one press release. Hundreds of artists impacted, thousands of audience members with gaps in the calendar.

Auckland Pride Festival in 2021. (Photo: Auckland Pride)

Audiences can fill gaps, easily. Artists, not so much.

The shows that can go ahead are barely any luckier. Events with fewer than 100 people still have to socially distance, so are going ahead with limited capacities, and the looming threat of an increasingly infectious virus. Artists and producers still have the anxiety, and the uncertainty, of coming into work every day knowing that tonight could be the night they have to cancel, the night that venue pops up as a location of interest, hell, maybe even the night they test positive themselves.

Nobody is arguing against the restrictions; we know why they’re there at this point. However, the removal of broad restrictions has been replaced with the burden of personal responsibility: “Do I put myself and my audience at risk to do my art?” 

It should be simple: no piece of art is worth getting sick or getting someone else sick for. It’s a horrible onus to put on artists and producers, and my heart goes out to those who have to come up with an answer to that question. There are no right answers, just unpleasant compromises.

These anxieties aren’t unique to the live arts. These anxieties descend on everybody who goes into a workplace or supermarket, or has an after-work beer with a mate. But these anxieties hit differently for artists. It’s the anxiety of running towards the finish line at full tilt, not knowing if the earth could suddenly open up, swallowing you and your career with one location of interest notification.

Yes, there’s government support (not enough), but government support doesn’t get you your time back. It doesn’t get the time you’ve spent twiddling your fingers because you can’t do the thing that you make a living from, the thing you love, the thing you’ve devoted your life to.

A pandemic requires that society makes sacrifices. We stay at home, we stay away from our friends, we lean on essential workers to keep the world running. Artists are not unique in making sacrifices for the better good. Hell, we’re even used to it, working long hours for less than we’re worth to bring a little more light into the world.

But sacrifice does not draw from an unlimited pool of resources. Love, passion and resilience all run out eventually. The community rallies around each other, but there will be a last straw. If you can’t do the thing you’ve worked your entire life to do, you will eventually find another thing. Passion does not keep the lights on. The great resignation becomes the great “why the fuck would I bother?”

The thing that Covid takes away from us all – the feeling of being safe and secure in a room with other people – takes everything away from artists. Right now, you might not feel it. But when you’re looking for something to do with your night and you see our spaces empty, you’ll feel it. When artists suffer, and when they have nothing left to sacrifice, audiences suffer. We all suffer.

For you, red light means stop. Wait for orange, wait for green, wait for normal life to resume. 

But if you work in the arts, this red light might be the one where you get out of the car, leave the keys in the ignition and walk away forever. 

Keep going!
Donations of food and water collected at Mt Smart stadium for families in Tonga. (Image: Tina Tiller)
Donations of food and water collected at Mt Smart stadium for families in Tonga. (Image: Tina Tiller)

SocietyJanuary 24, 2022

From Auckland to Nuku’alofa: The families sending aid and aroha to Tonga

Donations of food and water collected at Mt Smart stadium for families in Tonga. (Image: Tina Tiller)
Donations of food and water collected at Mt Smart stadium for families in Tonga. (Image: Tina Tiller)

Tonga faces a long road to recovery, with almost 85% of the country’s population affected by the violent eruption and tsunami last weekend, and many areas still scrambling to restore basic necessities. Sela Jane Hopgood shares her experience of helping her family pack supplies to send to relatives in Tonga.

On the Wednesday following the Hunga-Tonga-Hunga-Ha’apai volcano eruption and tsunami in Tonga, my dad’s family started a group chat that included all the first cousins and their partners. It was called “‘Aholelei tsunami help”. We rallied together to fill up two drums, or “talamu”, full of food, hygiene necessities and toiletries for our uncle, aunties and first cousins in Kolomotu’a.

We agreed to send our supplies via the initiative created by the Aotearoa Tonga Relief Committee. Auckland mayor Phil Goff had approved for containers to be stationed at Mt Smart stadium this past weekend, to be filled with drums and supplies from people wishing to send aid to their families in Tonga. The cost of shipping was waived thanks to the generosity of Sir Michael Jones and Matson Shipping. The first ship is planned to depart Auckland on January 25 and is expected to take one week to arrive in Tonga.

Volunteers helping families at the Mt Smart stadium donation drop for Tonga. (Photo: Sela Jane Hopgood)

On Thursday night I went to my local Pak’n Save to buy canned food, brown rice, mi goreng instant noodles, toilet paper, body wash, vegetable oil, Weetbix, biscuits, crackers, milkshake lollies and more. When I reached the checkout, the worker was curious as to why my two trolleys were packed with Mt Taranaki-like piles of items. “My family was struggling with food in Tonga post-tsunami, so this is for them,” I said. I learnt from our conversation that I was one of many Tongans to come through that day doing exactly the same thing. I did notice there were quite a number of items out of stock when I went through the aisles. 

That same night one of my cousins here in Auckland, Poliana Mahe, sent us updates on how the family was doing in Tonga. She managed to get in touch with family there and they sent her videos of the ashes covering their front yard and the family coming together in my aunty’s house for prayers. We couldn’t help but feel emotional seeing them there, all alive and giving thanks to God for surviving such an intense natural disaster. Mahe also shared that a lot of neighbouring houses that were damaged by the tsunami had taken refuge at my family’s home, which was thankfully still standing. My cousins in Tonga told Mahe that they were down to their last pot of food as they were feeding close to 60 people in their house. This is why our donations of food and water matter: by supporting our own family, they’ll be able to support those most vulnerable in their village.

My family planned to meet at Mt Smart on Friday late afternoon to pack the drums on site. However, live updates on the Aotearoa Tonga Relief Committee Facebook page informed us that the queue at the stadium was so big that the waiting time was three to four hours to get into the loading zone. The advice from Labour MPs Jenny Salesa and ‘Anahila Kanongata’a-Suisuiki was to come on Saturday instead.

Mt Smart stadium hosting families to drop off supplies to send to their families in Tonga. (Photo: Sela Jane Hopgood)

My Saturday started at 5.50am. One of my uncles lives minutes away from Mt Smart and so we all agreed to meet at his house and then drive together to the venue. We got to the gates at eight o’clock and waited close to two hours in the queue. When we drove in to find a spot to unload, my sister-in-law said to me that the environment reminded her of Tonga with the dusty gravel roads and large families gathering together to help one another.

We packed the first 200 litre drum in minutes, putting all the canned food and other heavy items on the bottom of the barrel and then the lighter items such as packets of two-minute noodles on top, filling the drum up to the brim. We had one more drum to fill, yet a lot of items were left in the boots of our cars, so we decided to utilise the offer from Sir Michael Jones, who had donated a truckload of empty boxes. We manage to fit all our shopping from three sets of ‘Aholelei families in Auckland into two barrels and six boxes worth, once packed, over $1000. We made the most of every gap we could find inside the drums and boxes, opening up boxes of muesli bars and fitting each bar into any gap we could see. We made sure all the essential items such as flour, rice and toilet paper had a spot in the drum. The volunteers walking around helped us tape up the boxes securely and ensured all the paperwork was completed, which had to include the family in Tonga’s address and phone number and the contents inside the drum or box.

While packing, we shared stories of what our families in Tonga have been going through. We talked about how volcanic ash on the ground is being blown by the wind, causing families to close all their windows and doors to stop it coming inside. People are living inside swelteringly hot houses with no ventilation and limited water until supplies from Aotearoa arrive; they’re spending most days resting until it it’s safe to go outside to clean. Tonga faces a long road to recovery, with most of the population affected by the violent eruption and tsunami that followed, and many areas still scrambling to restore basic necessities. The Tongan government released a statement saying that almost 85% of the country’s population of about 105,000 people has been affected by last weekend’s disaster. 

‘Aholelei family labelling every single box and drum with their family in Tonga’s details. (Photo: Sela Jane Hopgood)

Once our drums and boxes were sealed and had their form attached to them, we wrote the recipients’ names on the outside of each drum and box. I was filled with love and gratitude that I was in a position to support my family in Tonga and, more importantly, that they’re alive to receive the goods. We began cleaning up, and a forklift came by to pick up our drums and boxes to take inside the container. 

The volunteers on the ground were efficient, friendly and approachable, which made the whole process seamless. Everywhere around us you could hear families saying to the volunteers “mālō e ngaue”, which translates to thank you for your hard work. It was a beautiful experience to see families come and go, getting their work done and then leaving in a timely manner to ensure other families waiting at the gates had a chance to come through. The families present were both Tongan to non-Tongan, which was heartwarming to see. I drove away from Mt Smart with my cup full, knowing that my family in Tonga will be able to eat and serve other families who have sought shelter in their homes.

This is Public Interest Journalism funded through NZ On Air.

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