Cathy told me about one of her ancestors who was a lighthouse keeper. I wanted to use the lighthouse as a symbol for being an ancestor, a story holder, and lighting the way for younger generations who are trying to find their way home. I was thinking about wayfinding, about how we all used to follow the same stars to find our way home, to locate ourselves on land and on the ocean. We used to listen to how the waves sounded on the coastline to know if we were home, and now we follow lighthouses. I’ve never been wrapped in harakeke, woven mats, but I’ve been wrapped in stories of my islands, mountains and rivers. The lighthouse is merely a guide to get me there, whether that be returning home in a literal sense to our lands, or returning to a home within ourselves and our already-knowing.

I wanted this piece to be a gift, given in exchange for being able to listen to Cathy’s story and trusted to hold that story. As well as having responsibilities to our own lineages to hold story for our descendants, by living in this place I have a responsibility to hold and honour the stories from the place that I’m on, the place I grew up, the lands that raised me. To me a lighthouse is an honest image for the experience of learning about my lands and lineage while being in a place I don’t quite belong. I know what it’s like to reach for lighthouses in the absence of stars. While making this piece I was thinking about who my lighthouses are: who are the people who have guided me home? How can I be a good lighthouse for my descendants, how we can hold the stories of our people in our bellies like flames, how we can tend to the fire each day until we find ourselves home? How I can hold stories from my own lineage for my grandkids, their grandkids, in the same way that Cathy has done and so kindly shared?

I wanted to reference the use of light and fire in my physical work as well as incorporating textile work, as that’s what Cathy does. Using a medium like cyanotype, I was able to work with the sun and therefore with the land. The sun, the stars and fire have been used by many different Indigenous peoples forever, as tools for navigation and storytelling. Working in collaboration with the sun made me give up an aspect of control: the UV fluctuated and muddied the images in such a way that it led me back to starscapes and constellations, as the blurs of white look like stars to me. While it initially felt like a failure, it now feels like the perfect outcome. As what I want for both of us and all of our descendants is to know the names of our stars. 

I transformed the final cyanotypes into stop motion videos. In the videos, you can see a faint image of how the light travels around in a circle, representing the continuation of culture. Light circling around and around: it will go forever.