Description
Mother and Child, 2021
An extraordinary Tongan deity* holds the compass points of Mother and Child, defining the parameters of her world. Upright and purposeful, she bears past, present and future generations, a lifeforce spiralling outwards from the beginning of time. With a flower behind her ear, gently opened eyes, and an illuminated umbilicus, her power, once dimmed by Christianity, is reinvigorated.
*She is in the collection of the Auckland War Memorial Museum.
—Writer, Dr Billie Lythberg
