On April 19th, the Urban Sketchers Symposium instructor's team had the great opportunity to visit "Papakura Marae", a Maori complex near Auckland, in which the temple (wharenui) was inaugurated in 1990. During the short journey to the place, we learned a song from local organizer Eric Ngan (who arranged the tour) to be sang at the temple as a gift to the Maori people.
We then attended to a beautiful ceremony, with touching music performed by the Maori people. They weren't dressed traditionally as one could imagine as it wasn't a presentation for tourists, which made the moment even more remarkable.
After the ceremony was finished, we had a nice meal and had some time to do a sketch, even inside the temple, where I did mine.
I sketched a carving called Tamatea Pokaiwhenua, a leader navigator who arrived in New Zealand in 950 AD. A hill dedicated to leader is called:
"Te taumatawhakatangihangakoauaupukepikimaungahoronukupokaiwhenuakitanatahu", which means "Tamatea played his flute to lure his young lover to climb the hill without slipping as he waited and prepared a meal for them to share and make love".
Isn't that beautiful?
Later that day, I did a sketch of the city hall. I was a bit distracted by the skateboarders across th street. The weather was changing constantly which was a presage of the rain we got during the symposium. I wanted to make a loose watercolor as I did of the same Queen St. the day before, but I couln't, and I'm not sure why.
