OFFSTAGE 2

Tautai supports the development of contemporary pacific art through actively fostering and maintaining links between contemporary pacific visual artists.

Tautai was founded in New Zealand in the 1980s as an informal network from an initiative by Samoan artist Fatu Feu'u and friends together with a small group of then emerging artists. This group shared a goal of mutual support for the promotion of pacific visual art artists, including their own.This at a time when pacific art was in the very early stages of recognition as a particular genre.

The name Tautai draws on the Samoan word for navigator and, as a metaphor well illustrates the underlying ethos of the organisation, with the artists and their audience continuing to look to Tautai to provide direction.

There has been a phenomenal growth in recent years in the number of contemporary pacific visual artists practicing in New Zealand and in the recognition of their work. Tautai has been instrumental in assisting this recognition and continues to play an important role in maintaining and enhancing that growth through its support of pacific artists and more broadly in its advocacy for the art and artists.

The year 2005 marked the tenth anniversary of Tautai as a formalised legal entity. The first five years were devoted to organising group exhibition projects and to providing mutual support in a small network of establishing artists in a then new genre with very limited resources. In the second five years Tautai concentrated on building on that critical mass of new artists and during that period, with the input of annual funding from Creative New Zealand, more emphasis was able to be placed on building the educative, advocacy, and awareness functions for art and artists of pacific heritage.

Over the past ten years a whole new generation of artists have emerged with new vehicles of implementation for their art. Tautai, as an organisation supporting its charter, continues to grow in order to mentor, sustain, profile and build on this momentum and to engage with those new artists. Mindful of the environment in which it operates, Tautai continues to review and evolve its program of support, adapting programmes and focus to ensure it remains relevant in its assistance to pacific art and artists.

Tautai Contemporary Pacific Arts Trust was constituted as a charitable trust in June 1995. In January 2008 Tautai was registered by the Charities Commission as a charitable entity. Tautai receives major public funding from Creative New Zealand, the crown entity established as the national agency for development and funding of the arts in New Zealand. Tautai also receives significant funding from the ASB Community Trust which supports activities in Auckland and Northland. Tautai also obtains some funding from other sources including member and supporter annual subscriptions.