Maumahara Girlie

Overview

An activated receipt. An extended subtweet of colonisation. I am mana whenua online, finding soil in digital platforms. The destruction of waterways is the destruction of history; wet tears and live streams.

Created by Mya Morrison-Middleton in collaboration with Whetu Silver, Freddy Carr, Amanda Tito and Onehou Strickland, Maumahara Girlie is a digital age theatrical approach to colonisation and internalised whakama.

"GIRLIE" plays many role. "GIRLIE is the ingenue. GIRLIE was the daughter of Alice. She lives many lives. Tuberculosis kills her at 29 when she has five young babies. GIRLIE raised all her mokopuna and others too. GIRLIE's mokopuna all look like her. She has credit card debt that will outlive her. Her and Tamatea travel from Hawaiki to Te Waipounamu in the waka Tākitimu. Her skin is turning into pounamu on a river bed in Murihiku. She is raising nineteen children, some days all they eat is plums off a tree from the backyard. Her father is a lay priest in 1868 when the crown fails to uphold treaty contracts. She pulls fire from her fingernails for Maui. GIRLIE has one wairua and one mauri."

The contemporary show delves into the lives of modern Māori and how they reconcile themselves with their culture (or don't). The show promises to be a "visual installation, performance, myth and seminar" tracing through generations of Māori stories but through the use of modern media and theatre.