Siliga Setoga on Tagata Pasifika
an interview with Siliga setoga about his life, work and art.
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Siliga’s art is a reflection of living on the border of his Parents’ beloved Samoa and his New Zealand environment. “Our home was lil’ Samoa on a Palagi street in Mt Eden, Central Auckland.” Siliga’s Parents filled their home and family life with fa’a-Samoa. Siliga refers to his home as a “decolonized zone” where Samoan was the only language – “we were smacked if we spoke English”. He recalls his Mum’s Tauloto (scripture verse) “You speak English when you go to school but when you come home you speak Samoan”. But growing up with such strong Samoan influences in Auckland created a sense of confusion that contributed to Siliga “feeling neither here nor there and always wondering, questioning and searching for a place of belonging”. This search for belonging is a continual theme in his art, whether the belonging that his Parents’ generation struggled for or the belonging that his generation of New Zealand-born Samoans ache for.
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Tagata Pasifika
I loved this video of Siliga Setoga, about his life as a contemporary Samoan Artist, the aspects of Culture with a sence of self.
Getting the message across
Original - The Banana Box series ~ 'Influenza boxes installation' represents 'the spanish influenza' that wiped out a quarter of the samoan population.
Soifua (the can means farewell and health, although in the can is saturated with tomatoes, and salt inside the can etc).
The fish pacific, caught by the Asian traulers, packaged and the islanders buying back the fish is mad.
Mad skills
T-shirts, humble beginnings makes a statement at street level.
'Graphic Designer of T's cleverly titled 'chubby chops', cocoa nutz, this is not america,popo ...