Capstone // Too "FOB" to be Kiwi and too "plastic" to be Samoan.

Concept behind this idea was to work with people that feel lost and are questioning where they feel belong as an impact of diaspora. From a personal experience being a Samoan born and moving to New Zealand at the age of 8 it was a discussion that had a massive impact on my life that I never paid attention to until now. Going back to Samoa after being in New Zealand for 11 years was the trip that actually made me aware that I'm not the person that I thought I was.

Interviewing

I started interviewing people with my phone and asking them questions. 

- What worked was that the person that was being interviewed had a free flow of speech and they didn't hesitate to say anything they would say what they thought at the time and that was something I wanted.

-What didn't work was that i had to transcribe the interviews and that was gonna take long to do 

I had to have 2 different sets of questions because some people had options of moving out and some like myself didn't e.g my mu grew up knowing her culture already and that moving to New Zealand did not effect her connection to her culture like it did to me and my siblings.

The Diaspora generation

Profile form

Ethnicity:

Birth place:

Where do you live now?

What made you come to NZ?

Was it worth it?

Where is home?

Where do you feel belong?

Where is home?

Where do you feel belong?

How has being a diaspora impacted your connection with your culture? 

With the interviews everyone had different answer, people like Elisapeta her connection with her culture was not effected by her parents choice of moving over to New Zealand, which I thought was interesting but I still wanted to stick with my idea of only using people who are struggling with their culture in my project. The more I got to interview people the more decisions I had to make on who interview I wanted to use.

Elisapeta interview.

Profile

Elisapeta Ah Chong Thompson 😂

Where were you born: Moto’otua, Western Samoa

Ethnicity: Samoan Chinese

Where do you live now?

Manurewa, Auckland New Zealand

Where do you consider as home?

Samoa

Where do you feel belong?

Samoa, I'm originally from there so no matter where I go in life, I will always consider Samoa as my home.

Has being a diaspora impacted your connection with your culture, and if yes how?

To be honest, No it hasn't because like I said before no matter where I am I will still have a strong connection towards my culture A.K.A Aganu’u. I still get taught and treated like a tamaitai Samoa by my parents and elders. I reckon it all depends on the person and their parents, If you don't speak or get taught Fa’asamoa in your household or anywhere then that's where the problem of living in Diaspora begins.

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Mercy interview

Birth place:

Samoa

Ethnicity:

Samoan

Where do you live now?

Manurewa, Came to NZ when she was 7

Where do you consider as home?

Home is where my family, immediate family.

How has being a Diaspora affected you and your relation to your culture?

Being away from Samoa has affected my connection with my culture a lot, and School was the main cause of me losing that interest in my culture. There were Samoan classes in high school but I felt like I wasn't good enough to be in there like I wasn't Samoan enough. I think all this self doubt came from being called a “plastic” and I believed it, because the people that call me plastic were Samoans themselves and those people knew more about the Samoan culture better than I did so I ended up believing what they were saying because I had the idea that they knew better so I consider myself as a plastic Samoan.

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 In putting the work together I ended up not using all the interviews I felt like I had to to stick with what I believe in and show the ones I could relate most too. If I used all the other interviews and put them in the work it would hide what I wanted to share or what I wanted to voice out through my work and this is where I made the choice of using the 4 interviews. I think that these 4 were the strongest and the ones that made more sense to what i wanted to convey through my work.

With the first profile I made I simply made it simple like a normal flyer not much on the page to distract the viewer but focus on the writing. 

With the second one I edited the back ground on the photo because it was still distracting the not having a background gave it a nice clean look that I wanted to keep. The reason for the font was to have that script feel to it empathizing the idea of an interview or a typewriter.

 The idea of empathizing the "missing person" flyer is to create the idea of a person in search their identity or that missing piece of themselves and the reason for having them A3 is so that they can be seen clearly and especially with the texts. 

Exhibiting space.

I chose to exhibit outside because it was more open and a public space instead of having them inside like if you were actually looking for someone you would actually want to put them out and publicly as you could so that you can get to more people.

Wheat Paste.

I chose to use wheat paste because I wanted the posters to have that paste look that street posters have.

Final installation. 

Too "FOB" to be Kiwi and too "plastic" to be Samoan

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 Artist Biography

Grace Avealalo is a Samoan-born multi-media artist who focuses on the effects that Diaspora has on people who feel lost about who they are as well as where they belong. Avealalo does this through posters that she has created after interviewing other people who have fallen victim to the Diaspora influence.

Artist statement

Too “FOB” to be Kiwi but too “PLASTIC” to be Samoan.

Avealalo has always struggled with fitting in. Born in Samoa and moving to New Zealand at an adolescent age, Avealalo has struggled to fit in with society considering it as an uncomfortable place to live. Samoan being her first language and not knowing how to speak English confidently she was stereotyped as a FOB which Avelalao grew to accept. FOB stands for Fresh Off The Boat. FOB is used as a derogatory term for a recently arrived immigrant, who is perceived as lacking a firm grasp of the host country's language and culture. In 2013, Avealalo visited Samoa for the first time since her arrival in 2003. While being there she realised that she was treated differently, the feeling of comfort she thought she would find there did not exist. She was labeled as a “plastic” in her place of birth. The label of ‘Plastic’ is given to a person by someone else who feels that they have more cultural competence; that they speak the language; have more cultural knowledge. This was when Avealalo started feeling confused and lost with who she was.

This work “Too “-FOB” to be Kiwi but to “PLASTIC” to be Samoan” was inspired by her recent visit to Samoa. Avealalo has created posters with different people and their experiences with diaspora, sharing her own story hoping that it could give comfort to others who are struggling to fit in. Avealalo tries to convey the idea of a “lost identity” by creating missing flyer/posters to empathises the idea of a person that is in search of a missing piece of themselves and their identity.        

Research

Tatyana Fazlalizadeh

 For many women, just walking down the street can mean being subject to harassment by men—from subtle comments to overtly hostile remarks. Back in 2012, fed up with such treatment, Tatyana Fazlalizadeh, an oil painter by trade, decided to speak out: She produced an illustrated self-portrait with a caption—"Stop Telling Women To Smile"—and plastered copies all around her Brooklyn neighborhood. Since then, Fazlalizadeh has created countless posters, literally taking to the street to combat sexist harassment. Each piece features a different woman, with a caption that reflects her own experiences with public harassment. With $35,000 raised on Kickstarter, Fazlalizadeh has now taken her project, named after that first caption, on the road. In January, after visiting Chicago and Boston to interview women there about how they experience public spaces, she'll be headed to the West Coast to gather further inspiration for her posters.

Glenn Ligon slave bills

                 

 The Runaways is a series of ten 

lithographs based on nineteenth-century advertisements published by slave owners to locate runaway slaves. Ligon asked friends to write descriptions of him as if they were reporting a missing person to the police. He then rendered the text in typography that mimicked the original ads and paired them with drawings from newspapers and anti-slavery pamphlets of the time. Ligon explained, “‘Runaways is broadly about how an individual’s identity is inextricable from the way one is positioned in the culture, from the ways people see you, from historical and political contexts.

http://www.lacma.org/video/glenn-ligon-0

Ligon’s series Runaways (1993) references the unmistakable stain of American slavery while also calling into question the nature of identity and the power of language to capture it. On black-and-white lithographs, in a style combining the format of runaway slave posters with highly symbolic illustrations of the abolitionist movement, the artist presents ten distinct descriptions of himself supplied by ten friends asked to pretend they were filing a missing persons report. Each starts simply with the phrase “Ran away, …” Surprisingly, these twentieth-century verbal accounts mimic the text of actual fugitive slave posters, offering physical descriptions that bring to mind auction blocks. One short piece ends with the racially and historically weighted phrase “Nice teeth.” Yet adequate and stable definitions prove to be a moving target as Ligon’s skin color is described variously as “black,” “pretty dark-skinned,” and the nuanced “medium complexion (not ‘light skinned,’ not ‘dark skinned,’ slightly orange).” The power of language, oral and written, often gives a visceral quality to his work, at once revelatory, inadequate, confining, and slippery. After all, he seems to remind us, something as complex as a human being cannot be captured in mere words, whether on a slave poster or a modern-day newscast reporting a criminal suspect.

Ligon work is truly powerful, his work is a reflection and a statement. His work speaks about how people see and perceive him, I think its powerful with the acknowledgment of the African American slavery history. Even though Ligon places himself as a slave character in this work I see it as a brave move, I see Ligon taking that power the white masters had over his people. Being brave and taking authority in your own identity is something I want to show in my work I want to be understood and also to be acknowledge the way I want to be.

 Lana Lopesi

Lana Lopesi is a Samoan artist, based out of Auckland, New Zealand. She's currently preparing for her show called 'Seize the Time' based on the Pacific New Zealand history of the 50s to the 80s. Working very closely with the Polynesian Panthers she is attempting to educate Pacific youth about the history as a way of empowerment and breaking the cycles of oppression Pacific people face. In her project guide she quotes a man from the place I call home, "We want education that teaches us the true history and our role in the present day society". Huey P. Newton founder of the Black Panther Party that rose in Oakland neighborhoods to protect people initially from police brutality but also much more. And so with this and reading Lana's guide I have to wonder, that if I asked a Samoan kid in Oakland if s/he knows who the Polynesian Panthers are or yet alone the Black Panthers are? Are these histories who have a parrallel in lands who are divided by a whole ocean connected for that kid and if so, what's so vital to that kid's understanding of who they are knowing this connection in two different realities?.

Lanan work is inspirational I think that her way of educating youths and people who unfamiliar with the Black/Polynesian Panthers is cleaver, I think its a great idea to educate the younger generation on what our elders did and fought for and especially to acknowledging them as well. I think that her work is an eyeopener to our younger generation and its something that I want to do as well to educate them on how diaspora can impact our lives.

  

Gillian Wearing

 I decided that I wanted people to feel protected when they talked about certain things in their life that they wouldn’t want the public that knows them to know. I can understand that sort of holding on to things—it’s kind of part of British society to hold things in. I always think of Britain as being a place where you’re meant to keep your secrets—you should never tell your neighbors or tell anyone. Things are changing now, because the culture’s changed and the Internet has brought people out. We have Facebook and Twitter where people tell you small details of their life.

 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gillian_Wearing

I found Wearing work interesting her idea of having a police man hold a help sing makes the viewer rethink about how they view people that there is more to a person then what you see on the outside. This aspect of her work is something that I would like to show through my work too.


Paul Gauguian

 Where Do We Come From? What Are We? Where Are We Going?

The three fundamental questions in this catechism were: "Where does humanity come from?" "Where is it going to?", "How does humanity proceed?". Although in later life Gauguin was vociferously anticlerical, these questions from Dupanloup's catechism obviously had lodged in his mind, and "where?" became the key question that Gauguin asked in his art.
Looking for a society more simple and elemental than that of his native France, Gauguin left for Tahiti in 1891. In addition to several other paintings that express his highly individualistic mythology, he completed this painting in 1897 or 1898. Gauguin considered it a masterpiece and the grand culmination of his thought. He was in despair when he undertook the painting, mourning the tragic death of his favourite daughter earlier in the year and oppressed by debts, and had planned to kill himself on finishing it. He subsequently made an unsuccessful attempt with an overdose of arsenic. Thomson thinks it quite possible that he only painted in the inscription while recovering from the attempt.

 Paul Gauguian tells a story through his painting, asking asking questions to the reality of life. His works hold so much meaning and questions that would make us rethink our actions and decisions we've made in life in our past and future. I think that his work is a inspiration to my ideas because this is the kind of conversation that I want my work to create.   

"Plastic Coconut"

 

What next:

-With this experiment as a success I want to create a Samoa 'ava ceremony with the ritual item made out of plastic.

Tanoa - Bowl 

The bowl in which the drink is prepared is called a tanoa or laulau. 

Cup - ipu tau 'ava

The cup used for distributing the 'ava is made from the half shell of a ripe coconut and it is cleaned and polished.

Strainer - fau

The material for straining the woody fibre of the dried 'ava root is obtained from the bark of the fau tree (Hibiscus tiliaceus). This bark is stripped off and the outer skin removed. The remaining inner bark is then shredded and forms a type of stringy and fibrous mesh used to mix and strain the beverage in the wooden bowl.

Samoa 'ava ceremony

The ʻaumaga, 'ava makers must follow etiquette and cultural protocol in the making and serving of the 'ava. It is usually an honour to be selected for the ceremony. The ʻaumaga, with prescribed roles in the ceremony, were a select guild in the past.

 

The ʻAva Ceremony is one of the most important customs of the Samoa Islands. It is a solemn ritual in which a ceremonial beverage is shared to mark important occasions in Samoan society. The Samoan word ʻava (pronounced with the glottal stop) is a cognate of the Polynesian word kava associated with the kava cultures in Oceania. Both terms are understood in Samoa.
The 'Ava ceremony within Samoan culture retains the same ritual pattern with slight variations depending on the parties involved and the occasion. It always includes speeches and oratory and the formal drinking of 'ava, including women if they are part of the ceremony, with special attention paid to precedence in drinking order. One of the most important occasions for the 'Ava ceremony is during the bestowal of matai chiefly titles.

Experiment Plastice coconut

Process on making the plastic coconut.

This experiment was a challenge, it was my first time creating work with plastic but its was a idea I wanted to bring to life or at least have tried. Taking the stereotype of a "Plastic Coconut" literally and make a coconut out of plastic.

Pro:
-The concept of this idea was strong and it was something I really wanted to work with because I know that so much Polynesian people this generation could relate to.
-Making the plastic object was not difficult it was just a process that would have to take time and patient.
-This process was affordable an doable.

Cons:
-This only problem with this idea was the time frame I had and knowing what kind of person I'am a perfectionist I knew that this would need a longer time frame if I wanted to happy with my final project.

"Plastic"

The negative title of ‘Plastic’ is given to a person by someone else who feels that they have more cultural competence; that they speak the language; have more cultural knowledge etc. This body of work explores the intricacy of cultural hierarchies in diaspora and in Samoan culture, where individuals are singled out for being more or less authentic. Avealalo, has created objects that defines the Samoan cultural out of plastic eg. fine mat, fue, ula gifo ula fala as a statement that challenges and explores culture forms and construction. The stereotype “plastic Samoan” has a dramatic effect on this generation we have come to accept this stereotype and it has created invisible boundaries that has drawn this generation away from wanting to educate in culture.

My influence is from a personal perspective of Fa’a Samoa being plastic itself and my generation losing their interest in their culture because they feel like they don’t belong anymore due to the stereotype of being plastic. In this work I want viewers to understand how I feel about being a plastic Samoan and what I think about the fa’a Samoa. People should understand that culture change it does affects us individually and it shouldn’t create a value of feeling less belonging to your origin or culture identity.

Ex 9

Ex 8