My name is noa hāmana (b. 1998) I am a Naarm based interdisciplinary artist communicating 21st century Indigeneity. My art uses mātauranga Māori: which is the Māori way of engaging with the world through kawa (practices) and tikanga (principles)— to critique, examine, analyse, and understand the world.

I am from Ōtautahi, Christchurch, a descendant of Ngāti Kura, Te Whare tapu o Ngāpuhi, and Ingarangi (England). My educational background is in anthropology, literature, and toi Māori, which was an alchemical accident where I fused these disciplines together with painting to create a unique cultural vocabulary through world-building and storytelling.

My art is grounded and elevated by my whakapapa, as it opens windows into time, structures, stories, and people. With this, my creative practice is centred on the knowing-self: thought, memory, mind-heart, knowledge, and desire. Through this instrument of intuition I bring a psychological presence to my work that invokes dramatic scenes and heightened states.

I explore and critique different facets of colonialism, such as its religious and economic theories, and their continued effects of drudgery and deprivation. Time curls into itself and history ultimately becomes readable again. In doing so, I dive for the deepest fish of the sea and loosen the tangle at the bottom of the net.

E whai mahi hira ana i te moana waipū. 
Great works are done in deep waters