Noel Meek

A kōrero with Mamaku about River Health (at the point where Bathurst Resources test water quality) (2021)

10 min 39 secSingle channel / Digital Video / Colour / Sound

"A kōrero with Mamaku about River Health (at the point where Bathurst Resources test water quality) explores, with a resilient mamaku, the idea that the owners of the local Stockton coal mine can also be the arbiters of the quality of local river water. The Bathurst employee in charge of this was formerly an employee of the Department of Conservation."

"Ngākawau Kōrero reflect my personal connections to a contentious landscape, the Buller District. Currently at the thin end of the climate change wedge, this area has been home to the coal industry for over a century and, in more recent times, also to a strong environmentalist movement. My own family is split between generations of coal miners on one side and engaged environmentalists on the other. The tension between these is explored in collaboration with non-human entities at key nexus points in the region surrounding my family home in Hector, across the river from Ngākawau."

Noel Meek

Part of the series Ngākawau Kōrero (2021).

Other works in this series

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