Māori craftsmen – carving a future
Modern-day guardians of their art, Māori master carvers Clive Fugill and James Rickard have spent the past 40 years honing their skills at Te Puia - Māori Arts and Crafts Institute, in Rotorua, New Zealand.
In 1963, both men were in the first-ever intake at the institute that had been established by the New Zealand Government as a means of safe-guarding traditional Māori culture and crafts.
Carving and weaving, in particular, were integral to pre-European Māori culture as they served to record and pass on Māori history and legends.
Toi whakairo - art of carving
Māori believed that the gods created and communicated through the master carvers or tohunga whakairo.
Toi whakairo was a tapu art that was subject to the spiritual laws that governed day-to-day traditional Māori life.
Felling a tree was to cut down a descendant of Tane - the god of the forest and of man. Before committing such an act, a karakia or prayer was recited by the tohunga (priest) to ensure that the act of felling one of Tane’s offspring could be carried out safely.
Pieces of wood that fell from carving work were neither thrown away, nor used for cooking. Women were not permitted near carvings.
Traditional carved objects include taonga or treasures called waka huia -small boxes to hold cherished mementos, weapons, tools, musical instruments and meeting houses.
In Māori art, carvings emphasise curves rather than the straight lines featured in the work of other Polynesian cultures. The distinctive koru spiral form - inspired by the new growth of the ferns that grow abundantly in New Zealand forests - frequently appears.
Te Wananga Whakairo
Te Wananga Whakairo - the carving school at Te Puia - offers three-year courses teaching traditional skills.
The carving school’s staff of nine carvers includes master carvers Clive Fugill and James Rickard who were in the first class of seven students in 1967.
Rickard is the head of the Te Puia carving school.
Clive Fugill - master carver
 Clive Fugill was one of seven students in the New Zealand Māori Arts and Crafts Institute’s first three-year carving course, which began in 1967.
Fugill - whose tribal affiliations are Tainui and Ngāi Ranginui - has now worked at Te Puia for almost 40 years. He has been master carver for the past 21 years, overseeing the training of a whole generation of new carvers.
"If we lose our arts and crafts we lose our identity," Fugill says. "It’s important that we pass on our art to future generations, to show our unique art form worldwide."
The young Fugill, who was the graduate of honour for his intake, developed his carving skills under the watchful eye of the school’s first master carver the late Hone Taiapa.
Eventually, he and two other classmates from that original course took over the Institute’s traditional carving programme.
During his career Fugill has worked or supervised the carving of many wharenui - meeting houses. He has also travelled New Zealand and the world demonstrating the art of whakairo in the US, Canada, Japan, New Guinea, Hawaii, and Thailand.
Fugill’s carving work has been commissioned as gifts for royalty, heads of state, and for Māori kaumatua (elders). His works are also on show in many New Zealand embassies.
James Rickard - master carver
 James Rickard was a student in the very first intake at Te Wananga Whakairo carving school in 1967.
Four decades on, Rickard is still at the New Zealand Māori Arts and Crafts Institute and is the principal of the carving school.
Rickard - who is of Ngāti Porou and Tainui tribal descent - believes that the institute has had an important influence in retaining the art of whakairo because it has created "an unbroken line of traditional art from Ruatepupuke [a Māori ancestor] down to today’s graduates."
The school’s role within the Māori community is crucial and is "a necessary part of the survival of our culture, if you continually change bits and pieces of your culture you’re going to end up with nothing. The legacy of Te Puia is to maintain what we have".
James Rickard is a prolific carver who has represented Te Puia and New Zealand at many international events.
He is currently overseeing carving of a 10-metre high waharoa or Māori gateway for the 2010 Shanghai World Expo. The gateway - named Te Kakano or ‘the seed’ - will be New Zealand’s gift to the people of China.
More information
Te Puia - Maori arts and crafts
Te Kakano - Maori carving sets sail for Shanghai
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