Artist Profile: Ruth Green Cole

Ngapuhi, Te Arawa

Since completing a Bachelor of Fine Arts from Elam, Auckland, New Zealand. I continue to develop my professional practice as an emerging, contemporary New Zealand printmaker. I was drawn to printmaking from a young age, enjoying the multidisciplinary approach it offers.

My art practice is multidisciplinary, merging elements of print, paper construction, weaving and installation. The development of my work has come about through a personal comprehension and appreciation of the facets of my history. I look to the past to address my Maori traditional heritage in a contemporary context. My iwi (tribe) affiliations’ are Nga Puhi (Hokianga, Northland, New Zealand), Te Arawa (Ngati Pikiao, Bay of Plenty, Central New Zealand) and Pakeha (European Descent).

The museum is a container, a colonial tool in which to examine a culture. I create cultural artifacts, whose forms suggest they could be used for human adornment. I replicate textiles and materials from the real world and weave them into objects that embody cultural identity, from inside the world of the museum. I present my work in a museum display context because this is how I have collected the traditional seeds of my identity.

Most of my knowledge of my Maori heritage hasn’t been traditionally passed on through oral traditions or the passing of skills from mother to daughter. I have had to go to modern documentation methods such as books and exploration of museum collections as a reference point for understanding my heritage. My work aims to create a dialogue between two New Zealand cultures, Maori and Pakeha. These threads weave through my life as the two cultures I collected at birth.

My work is a container for my self.

“For it is invariably oneself that one collects.” - Jean Baudrillard