Family, Dusky Bay, NZ/ Whānau, Tamatea, Aotearoa

The earth trembles from time to time and shrugs its cover of snow from high peaks into the water.  Tau Moana, where the mountain dips five fingers into the sea and provides sanctuary to those who have no care to be found, like the kea or kiwi.  Occasional sea bourn visitors lift a speculating eye from the deep or sun their oily coats on the rocky shore, safe from the now extinct sealers and whalers.  Resolution Island is the name on the map.  Dusky Bay the name of its front door, the way in from the sea.  The Maori name for this inlet is Tamatea, after the ancient South Pacific explorer.  Some stop and look; some stay a while; some never come but know this place from their dreams.

 

1770

We would all like to feel some land beneath our feet, but this coast does not offer us sanctuary.  Each inlet is treacherous with steep-sided mountains, jutting rocks, underwater reefs, and yet we are tempted with a glimpse of paradise, if only we could get there.  I can read the minds of the men around me as they look at the dense black-green land which lies beyond the jagged frame of the bay.  They dream of roasted meat, a sweet dream but not worth pitching ourselves upon the rocks for.  We have not come so far to end so ignobly.  This ship is not named ‘Endeavour’ for nothing.  My first duty is to record and then bring my findings back to England. 

England, I keep it as a beacon in my mind, but truth be told, it is no longer the central beating heart it once was for me.  The world holds so much more when one is in it, more than any map is able to chart.  Still, chart it we must and this place, descending into darkness as the dusk eats it up, may be a picture of enchantment with countless  silver stars lighting the sky above, but nothing casts enough light to assure me of a safe landing.  So there it is.  I’ll call you ‘Dusky Bay’ and note your name on this slowly growing map.  On we go, into the unchartered dark.

 

1773

I still dream of the taniwa I saw three summers ago.  I can close my eyes and see it as clearly as I did that strange evening when I was a small girl.  I see its dark shadow against the deep blue-black of the sky, something huge and bony rising from the sea, a taniwa for sure.  The sea is full of things we can never know.  It gives us good things to eat then lashes the land to shreds.  We are the people who live with the sea, we cross it, dipping our paddles into it and we know it plays with us, indulges us with small kindnesses.  The sea is temperamental, like mother, one moment it is all song and strokes and sweet smiles, and then, from nowhere, fury, shouting, slaps.  She says I see taniwas all around, I do.   

I was by the water’s edge at sunrise.  I paddled in the icy water and picked pipis from the sand, sucked their sweet, salty flesh from their shells, when I saw two dark eyes look at me from the water, a kekeno speaking to me without sounds of something strange coming.  It was right as when I looked up I saw the shape of the taniwa of my dreams.

I ran and hid, then ran again to tell of what I had seen.  Of course, no one believed me until they had seen it with their own eyes.

I watch whaea from a distance.  I feel safe up here in this cave, but she is fearless.  She is hunting for tītī with her spear.  ‘No strange men will stop me from eating well,’ she boomed last night.  I notice that she keeps well away from the white men though. 

I can see them too from up here.  The thing I thought was a taniwa is a big canoe and they are fixing it up.  They’ve made a camp on the shore, but every night they go back and sleep on the big canoe.

I’ve heard stories of how my ancestors were defeated in battle and that is why we move from island to island, and keep away from the land of other tribes, but I don’t believe these men are anything to do with them. 

 

Dusky Bay is indeed a rich resource for any sort of artist.  Wherever I turn I see something to cause delight and intrigue.  I might take the sea, the land, or our own fine ship in the midst, as subjects, but more compelling than any of these are the inhabitants of this place on the edge of the world.

As a people they seem timid but kind. On the second morning of our sojourn a small delegation approached us, bearing gifts of meat and berries.  We reciprocated with various baubles brought with us for this purpose. 

This contact gave me the opportunity to observe them quite closely and I have managed to make a series of sketches which details their particular costumes and ornamentations.

They dress in a coarse fabric interwoven with the feathers of sea birds and resemble nothing so much as skittering birds when one does catch sight of them about their business. 

The men have patterns cut into their skin all over their bodies, the women simply on their chin.  The women carry long spears and the men green stone clubs or paddles.

The repairs to the Resolution are making rapid progress and I fear that I shall not have time to record all that there is to see here.

I have managed to look inside a hut, but none of the inhabitants were present and all I saw was a woven mat. 

There are caves which could provide some shelter, but although I found a few large bones of some sort of giant bird in one of them, there is no real evidence of anyone using them as homes.

Although there is so much to commend this place, I cannot comprehend how these people survive the high seas and strong winds of the winter.  Perhaps they travel back to the mainland.  This is something I shall never know as I have found no way to communicate with these natives and they are most reluctant to have anything to do with us.

At least my sketch book is full and my head is stuffed with plans for future compositions.

 

1776

Yet another commission, we are going up in the world!  This time I am to work with the sketches of the renowned artist, William Hodges.  Yes!  The very man who accompanied Captain James Cook on his famous expeditions to the far side of the world.  There is to be a book made recounting his adventures and I am to make the engravings.

I can rest assured that the smart new home I bought for my Mary here in Kennington Road is safe, as the book is bound to be popular, and in any case, I am to be paid a tidy sum whatever the outcome. 

Those hard days in Spitalfields are long behind me.  We are living in changing times.  All corners of the earth have been explored and offer endless opportunity; each day a new scientific discovery is made, and a poor French boy from the Huguenot quarter is implored by our greatest luminaries to create the images that will feed the imagination of the public.

The image I am working with is ‘Family in Dusky Bay’.  I have sketches of the bay; they are rough but so expressive that I can smell the freshness of the clean air over the tainted air I actually breathe in.  Then there are various drawings of males, females and children in wild attire.  Somehow I must place them in a manner to suggest familial relations in this forbidding landscape.

A little softening of the backdrop perhaps.  A  strong yet sweet mother, just here.  The proud father gazing in admiration at his winsome wife, here.  And the children, the girl in particular, in pensive contemplation of her parents, thinking, perhaps, of what she may become.

There, a pleasing composition.  Could be a family from Spitalfields, or the Loire or – anywhere.  The transcendent image of the family, transported to – Dusky Bay.

And so to work.  It is all about the eyes, you need good eyes and a steady hand for this sort of work.  It is the mind’s eye that gives my work the edge though.

Mary asked me if I wouldn’t like to travel like William Hodges and see the world for myself.  I laughed and held her hand.  I have all of the world, and more, in my mind, and my hand.

 

1794

The water ran red with blood.  I close my eyes and see red.  I hear their cries long after they have been clubbed and skinned.  I look at the walls of the cave and see large brown eyes speaking of their lives, telling me all that they have seen. 

The slaughter is relentless.  Why do I stay?  Everyone has a place that speaks to them, this I believe.  This is the place I must be.

The others have moved on and I live amongst these who kill so lightly.  They would kill me, but they are too busy. 

I must witness the killing.  I mark the deaths.  I feel them move from life into spirits.  It will not always be so, but for these ones it is. 

I cling to life like a werewere on a rock.  Someday they will strike me down.  Who will witness that?  Will anyone ever know that I lived?

 

I am proud to bear the name Lerpiniere.  Dear Daniel has been dead for nine years, but I am surrounded by his memory.  His work has been so successful that his name is known.

Our children have grown and have gone out into the world.  I think about that world that he drew.  Scenes from history set all over the world.  They all have a singular familiarity to me, they sprang from his mind. 

My favourite remains a simple print I keep on my bedroom wall in a dark wood frame: ‘Family in Dusky Bay’.  I smile when I look at it, for of course there I am, and the children, and, dear Daniel, dressed in wild attire and with patterns on his skin. 

There we are in a place that is far away and yet is always here.

 

You might travel to Tamatea and see its secret beauty; or you might close your eyes and feel a slight change in the air.  Dusky Bay, Tamatea, it is there.