The Painted House at Patutahi

Te Ao Hou, March 1964, Page 32

After 75 years the paintings in the porch are battered by the weather, but they have otherwise survived unchanged. The Painted House at Patutahi by Margaret Orbell The meeting-house in which these photographs were taken stands at Repongaere, near Patutahi in the Gisborne district. The house is known to some people as Rongopai, and to others as Eriopeta. It was formerly tapu, but recently, in a ceremony conducted by the Ringatu Church, the tapu was lifted. Because of this it is now possible for the first time to photograph the building. In 1888, when Te Kooti announced his intention of visiting the district, his followers hastily erected this house to accommodate him and his retinue. The work was carried out by the young men of the tribe (Whanau a Kai). But when the elders entered the house at its opening, they were profoundly shocked to see how far the young men, in decorating it, had departed from the traditional designs. Many of the paintings in the house had no relevance to tribal matters; there were strange animals, and stylized foliage, and little scenes showing such incidents as a boxing match, a man hunting with his dogs, and a horse race. What may well have upset the elders still more,

however, is the spirit in which the artists had portrayed those subjects which were traditional. The old gravity and reverence had gone, and the figures of ancestors were depicted with a light-heartedness which must have appeared dangerously frivolous; there is even one ancestor who wears in his head not a huia feather, but a Scotch thistle. When the elders saw this, they prophesied that because of this desecration Te Kooti would never enter the house. The building became tapu at once, and Te Kooti never did visit the district. Like most of the great houses built in different parts of the country by Te Kooti's followers, this meeting-house is very large; altogether it is 85 feet long by 35 feet wide. Although a certain amount of maintenance work has been done from time to time (there is corrugated iron over its raupo roof, and the walls are set in concrete), the house has in most ways been left as it was when it was built 75 years ago. The door and window in the porch wall are the old-fashioned sliding panels, and This warrior with his taiaha is Kahungunu, one of the most famous ancestors on the East Coast. there are no other windows in the building. It still has an earth floor. In many other old meeting-houses, decorative paintings have been destroyed during renovations; but in this case, perhaps because of the tapu, they have been left almost untouched. The paintings in the porch (some are shown on page 32) are among the most interesting, but they are so battered and worn by the weather that they do not, at first sight, give one much idea of what to expect inside the building. It is an astonishing moment when one first sees the painted interior. When you push aside the door the wide, long building is dark inside, since the only window is a wooden one. There are about 20 panels (poupou) on each of the walls to the right and left, and all of them are elaborately decorated: some with Maori designs, and some with elaborately twining plants—curious trees and vines, some of them bright with fruit and flowers, with birds flying among them, and people climbing in their branches. At the far end of the building, and also in the wall in which the This woman holding a rose in her hand wears a dress with what seems to be a Victorian bustle.

A detail of one of the poupou (panels) on the walls. The paintings, which cover every available space in the house, combine a lively, rather naive realism with light-hearted fantasy.

The bold rhythms of the kowhaiwhai designs give strength and coherence to the other decorations in the building. This photograph shows the upper part of the back wall. door is placed, painted ancestors flourish mere and taiaha, seeming, in this vast, still building, like figures standing in the twilight in a strange garden. Above them, sinuous creatures similar in appearance to carved ones soar up toward the roof.