Journal of New Zealand & Pacific Studies - Volume 13, Issue 1, 2025

This article considers three contemporary art installations that were made during public workshops, in which volunteers helped to construct the final art piece. Quandamooka artist Megan Cope’s Whispers (2023) was a monumental installation at the Sydney Opera House made of thousands of oyster shells cleaned and prepared by volunteers across the city. The recurring installation Bottled Ocean (2014–present), by Māori artist George Nuku (Ngāti Kahunguna and Ngāti Tūwharetoa), sources its materials from plastic waste donated by local communities where the piece is exhibited and the host institutions held numerous workshops in which those same communities transformed their waste into vivid marine creatures. To make the permanent installation Hulali i ka lā (2016) at the Prince Waikiki Resort in Honolulu, Kanaka Maoli artist Kaili Chun invited the hotel’s employees to contribute to a school of metal fish swimming towards the ocean just outside. Each of these installations engages with ecological issues facing marine ecosystems in Oceania. Putting art historical frameworks of collaboration and participatory praxis into conversation with climate justice discourses about coalitions and alliance-building, this article argues that these case studies form critical relationships not just between different people but also between people and their environments.

African American actress and singer Juanita Hall won a 1950 Tony Award for her portrayal of Bloody Mary, the Vietnamese mother in the South Pacific musical who seeks a better life for her mixed-race daughter than what is possible on a French-controlled island in Melanesia during World War II. But the American Marine officer chosen by Bloody Mary to partner with her daughter is conditioned by his racism and prejudice against interracial relationships. Debuting in 1949, the character’s attitudes align with those of the segregated United States. Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein II intended to promote racial tolerance through this Broadway production, which is evidenced by their casting of Juanita Hall, among other gestures. The actress’ portrayal in 1949 becomes the benchmark for comparison for later productions. The musical’s success prompted a plethora of images featuring Hall as Bloody Mary; the character’s military jacket and capri pants would become iconic. The intent of the musical is racial tolerance, yet what are the implications of an African American actress portraying a Vietnamese character who lives on a Melanesian island during World War II? Utilizing Black Pacific theory, this article addresses the visibility and invisibility of Black, Pacific and Asian lived experience in the musical and the resulting visual imagery that becomes the paradigm for ensuing productions onstage and in film.

Review of: Encounters across Time, Judith Binney (2023)

Wellington: Bridget Williams Books, 200 pp.,

ISBN 978 1 99004 614 8 (pbk), NZ$17.99

Review of: Gardens of Gold: Place-Making in Papua New Guinea, Jamon Alex Halvaksz (2020)

Seattle, WA: University of Washington Press, 242 pp.,

ISBN 978 0 29574 759 0 (pbk), US$35

Review of: Morning Star Rising: The Politics of Decolonization in West Papua, Camellia Webb-Gannon (2021)

Honolulu, HI: University of Hawai’i Press, 228 pp.,

ISBN 978 0 82488 888 6 (pbk), US$28

Review of: Haunted Pacific: Anthropologists Investigate Spectral Apparitions across Oceania, Roger Ivar Lohmann (ed.) (2019)

Durham, NC: Carolina Academic Press, 256 pp.,

ISBN 978 1 53101 412 4 (pbk), US$38

Review of: Refocusing Ethnographic Museums through Oceanic Lenses, Philipp Schorch with Noelle M. K. Y. Kahanu, Sean Mallon, Christián Moreno Pakarati, Mara Mulrooney, Nina Tonga and Ty P. Kāwika Tengan (2020)

Honolulu, HI: University of Hawai’i Press, 316 pp.,

ISBN 978 0 82488 986 9 (pbk), US$32

Objects as Insights: R. H. Codrington’s Ethnographic Collections from Melanesia, Nick Stanley (2021)

London: The British Museum Press, 110 pp.,

ISBN 978 0 86159 235 7 (pbk), £23

Review of: Secret History: State Surveillance in New Zealand, 1900–1956, Richard S. Hill and Steven Loveridge (2023)

Auckland: Auckland University Press, 448 pp.,

ISBN 978 1 86940 985 2 (hbk), NZ$79.99

Review of: Foreign Judges in the Pacific, Anna Dziedzic (2021)

London: Bloomsbury Publishing, 233 pp.,

ISBN 978 1 50994 286 2 (hbk), £90

Review of: New Zealand Nurses: Caring for Our People 1880–1950, Pamela Wood (2022)

Dunedin: Otago University Press, 376 pp.,

ISBN 978 1 99004 832 6 (pbk), NZ$45

Review of: Blood and Dirt: Prison Labour and the Making of New Zealand, Jared Davidson (2023)

Wellington: Bridget Williams Books, 304 pp.,

ISBN 978 1 99103 340 6 (hbk), NZ$49.99

Review of: Rugby League in New Zealand: A People’s History, Ryan Bodman (2023)

Wellington: Bridget Williams Books, 364 pp.,

ISBN 978 1 99103 344 4 (pbk), NZ$59.99

Review of: A Clear Dawn: New Asian Voices from Aotearoa New Zealand, Paula Morris and Alison Wong (eds) (2021)

Auckland: Auckland University Press, 352 pp.,

ISBN 978 1 86940 947 0 (pbk), NZ$49.99

Review of: Linguistic Landscaping and the Pacific Region: Colonization, Indigenous Identities, and Critical Discourse Theory, Diane Elizabeth Johnson (2021)

Lanham, MD: Lexington Books, 149 pp.,

ISBN 978 1 79361 120 8 (pbk), US$39.99

Review of: Migrant Ecologies: Environmental Histories of the Pacific World, James Beattie, Ryan Tucker Jones and Edward Dallam Melillo (eds) (2023)

Honolulu, HI: University of Hawai’i Press, 316 pp.,

ISBN 978 0 82489 106 0 (hbk), US$68

Review of: The Social Space of the Essay 2003–2023, Ian Wedde (2024)

Wellington: Te Herenga Waka University Press, 480 pp.,

ISBN 978 1 77692 121 8 (pbk), NZ$50