Nau mai ki te kawerongo o Ngā Taonga — welcome to our newsletter

In this issue we share a special Matariki compilation looking at food practices and storage duing the Māori New Year. The silent footage in this archival programme has a taonga pūoro soundtrack and narration. We also share a special presentation from our Chief Executive about Wellington place names.

On the blog, we take a look at New Zealand works that have made the jump from the page to the screen.

We also have two important policy updates to share – Tiakina, the Kaitiaki Relationship Framework and a new Deposit Agreement – both designed to help us serve New Zealanders better.

Special Matariki online presentation

I whakahiatongia e tā mātou Kaitoko Kaupapa Torotoronga ā-Iwi Matua, a Lawrence Wharerau tēnei kaupapa kiriata mō ngā āhuatanga me ngā tikanga kai o Matariki, arā, ko te Tau Hou Māori. Kua tāpiri mai te reo taonga puoro me te kōrero whakamārama hoki ki ēnei whakaahua wahangū.

Arā anō tētahi whakairinga rangitaki. He kōrero anō mō ngā kiriata, otiira hoki mō te kāhui whetū whakahirahira a Matariki me ana tikanga.

Matariki is the Māori New Year and an important time in New Zealand. Lawrence Wharerau, our Outreach Curator Māori Specialist – Kaitoko Kaupapa Torotoronga ā-Iwi, provides some background on the festival and describes the footage in our special programme Kānapanapa mai ana a Matariki, compiled from historical footage of traditional Māori pre-new year activities like muttonbirding, crop harvesting, fishing and hāngī. 

Taunaha Whenua – Naming the Land

Last week, Ngā Taonga Tumu Whakarae Honiana Love (Te Ātiawa, Taranaki, Ngā Ruahinerangi) presented an extremely popular oral history of place names used by mana whenua for the Wellington region. Coinciding with Matariki and a time of reflection, this kōrero to a packed auditorium resonated with an increasing interest in traditional place names. 'There’s been a resurgence', Love said, 'with old names coming out of the landscape'.

Watch the presentation online and learn more. Presented in partnership with the National Library of New Zealand and Wellington City Libraries.

From the page to the screen – book adaptations

Many pre-existing legends, indigenous oral histories, short stories and novels have been adapted into moving image and sound recordings. In Aotearoa New Zealand, plenty of screen stories have come from written works as book-to-film adaptations. Recently we've seen The Luminaries brought to the screen, and The Imaginary Lives of James Pōneke optioned by Taika Waititi's production company. 

We turned the pages on a few classic New Zealand books that became films and TV shows. If you’ve seen the movie, maybe you could read the book? Or if you liked the book, you could check out the movie. Let us know in the comments which you think is better.

Tiakina, the Kaitiaki Relationship Framework

E hari ana mātou ki te whakarewa i tā mātou Kaupapahere Hononga Kaitiakitanga, arā, ko Tiakina tēnā. Mā Tiakina e hāpai i te kaupapa Māori i roto i ā mātou nei mahi pupuri taonga, e hiki hoki i te mana Kaitiaki (nō ratou ngā taonga tuku iho) ki ngā Taonga Māori. Māna anō e akiaki i tā mātou mahi tahi me te iwi Māori i roto i te pono, ā, e whakaaetia hoki te rangatiratanga o te Māori ki ā rātou ake taonga. Kei te whakatinana anō hoki te kaupapahere nei i te oati pūranga taonga a Ngā Taonga, arā, kia whakawhānaunga mātou ki ngā iwi, ngā hapū me ngā whānau.

We're pleased to launch Tiakina, our Kaitiaki Relationship Framework. It's the latest development in our aspirations to be kaupapa-centred and uphold the rights of Kaitiaki (enduring traditional owners) of Taonga Māori. It also aims to build more collaboration and trust with Māori and allow them to exercise mana and control over how their taonga are made available. This framework reflects the historic and ongoing archival commitment of Ngā Taonga to build meaningful relationships with iwi, hapū and whānau. 

New Deposit Agreement

As part of our strategy to improve access to our collections, we’ve developed a new Deposit Agreement that will cover any future deposits of audiovisual material with Ngā Taonga. It’s designed to offer you clear choices about how your materials can be used from the day you deposit them, and provides us with more information about what you need from us.

Although it is a legal document, we’ve worked to make the new Agreement easy to read and understand. This will help us safeguard the rights of depositors, while allowing access and use within clearly defined boundaries. If you’re an existing depositor, your previous Deposit Agreement(s) won’t be affected by the change. 

Whānau Mārama – New Zealand International Film Festival

Whānau Mārama, the New Zealand International Film Festival, is back with a cutting edge 'hybrid festival': At Home – Online, and in cinemas. With its online reach, the Festival can extend the cinematic options of audiences and filmmakers throughout New Zealand. We're particularly interested in the Out of the Past collection, which showcases found footage and archival film. 

• We shared a new scan of footage taken at Punakaiki – Pancake Rocks in 1928. Our high-tech film scanners capture an enormous amount of information from each frame. When we compare the latest version with an earlier one, the differences are remarkable. 
• One of this month's most viewed items on our online catalogue was footage of the 1932 Gisborne and Wairoa Earthquake.
• Video Games Day on 8 July was a nice time to look back at our 2014 project collecting early New Zealand video games.

Are there things you'd like to read about, or do you have suggestions for how we present our newsletter? Your feedback is always welcome – please email us.