New Zealand values its rich heritage of Maori culture. Artist TeRongo Kirkwood was commissioned by Creative NZ to create a new body of work,representing the Kahu or Maori Cloak, in contemporary form. Ka Awatea:
The story of Life through Light, is the resulting work.
The Kahu, created with a combination of woven and glass elements, each represent a stage of life from a spiritual perspective.
The challenge was to develop an exhibit to showcase the four cloaks in an innovative fashion utilising technology to deliver an immersive experience.
The Cloaks are mounted on a circular core centre. Each cloak is lit from within and without, the lighting following a programmed pattern.
A soundcape subtly sets the mood within the exhibition room, whilst each cloak emanates its own sounds, adding to the whole.
Three cloaks project videos of words and phrases onto surrounding walls.
The combination of the works, Audio, Video and lighting, creates an incredibly powerful experience.
Traditionally, in this environment, museums have had to rely on multiple DVD machines, and synchronised multiple Audio Devices. Using Wallflower developed in New Zealand by Wallflower Advanced Digital Signage, all of this is taken care of with one very simple software package.
The AV consultant for the project, Matt Smith commented, ‘In short Wallflower is the perfect solution for Museum AV and lighting based exhibitions. As a user it just works. The great thing was that the system is so easy and intuitive to use, and there’s great support from the company if you have any queries. From the time we turned it on, till now, Wallflower has run the system flawlessly without one single glitch!’
The images below show the exhibit from the entrance and the four cloaks and projections.
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