Skip to content

Home
Search
Your album
Learn more

Images

A native woman making the kaitaka.

Alexander Turnbull Library | All Rights Reserved

Start Zooming Stop Zooming

Current search
Add To Album

Date

1848

Artist

Charles Heaphy (1820-1881)

Collection

Alexander Turnbull Library

Image Link

https://natlib.govt.nz/records/23073372

Description

Pencil and watercolour drawing shows a young Maori woman seated on the ground in front of a decorated whare, with carved tekoteko figure and painted maihi (barge boards). The young woman is engaged in weaving a cloak which is suspended on a rope between two poles. The upper edge of the woven piece has a taniko border. A kete lies on the ground beside the girl who wears European dress beneath her own kakahu. A tree fern and cabbage tree are shown in the left background.

A kaitaka is a category of fine kakahu (woven Maori cloak). The gallery catalogue says: "The manufacture of kakahu is an intensive process requiring consummate skill. After the muka fibre has been prepared a set of turuturu (weaving pegs) are secured in the ground. Vertical warps are suspended between the pegs and the wefts are then twisted across them from left to right, using a finger-weaving technique known as whatu. Kaitaka are typically large and are manufactured using finely woven unbeaten muka fibre which produces a characteristic golden hue and silky sheen ... the lower and side borders of the kaitaka are often finished with attractive bands of taniko. ... This image by Heaphy is unusual if accurate, since the kaitaka has been commenced with the taniko border usually worn at the bottom of the kakahu" [Text explains that kaitaka differ from other kakahu construction in being woven the same way up as the finished cloak is to be worn].

A similar watercolour exists in the Department of Manuscripts at the British Library in London and is entitled "Half-caste girl making a kaitaka". See further notes about the work in John Leech Gallery catalogue 2006, page 15.

Image Licence

All Rights Reserved

Image Credit

Alexander Turnbull Library

Location

New Zealand

Country

Tags

Arts
Huts
Domestic Life

Category

People & Society

Glossary
Search tips

© 2024 Watercolour World | Technology by The Museum Platform

© 2024 Watercolour World | Technology by The Museum Platform