Maori are transforming exhibition spaces in museums and galleries worldwide, according to local academic Conal McCarthy. The Director of the Museum & Heritage Studies programme at Victoria University of Wellington and former exhibition developer at Te Papa has recently written a book on the subject: Exhibiting Maori: A History of Colonial Cultures of Display, published by Te Papa Press.Maori are transforming exhibition spaces in museums and galleries worldwide, according to local academic Conal McCarthy. The Director of the Museum & Heritage Studies programme at Victoria University of Wellington and former exhibition developer at Te Papa has recently written a book on the subject: Exhibiting Maori: A History of Colonial Cultures of Display, published by Te Papa Press.Where ethnic objects were once described from a purely European perspective as 'curios' or 'artifacts', museums internationally are adopting new collaborative approaches to exhibitions. This process of consulting with the communities those objects came from was pioneered in New Zealand.

McCarthy sees this change as a direct result of much hard work behind the scenes by Maori, who resisted, collaborated and eventually took control of the culture of display and its treatment of their taonga.

"The exhibition Te Maori back in the 1980s was a fantastic example of the extraordinary success Maori have had at intervening in museum representations of their culture," explains McCarthy.

"It was an event and a cultural experience that went beyond the museum field and has had an impact on New Zealand society as a whole.

"But the surprising thing about the history of the Maori engagement with museums goes back much further than we thought, to exhibitions in Philadelphia and Sydney in the late 19th century."

Exhibiting Maori: A History of Colonial Cultures of Display by Conal McCarthy is published by Te Papa Press. It is available for purchase for $69.99 from all good bookstores or on-line from www.tepapapress.co.nz.

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