The Tiapapata Art Centre, with support under the ACP-EU Programme Enhancing capacity for the sustainability of the cultural and creative industries in the Pacific, hosted a Stone Tools Symposium last Saturday, 18 May, to mark International Museum Day.

The theme for this year’s day, “Museums for Education and Research,” highlights the importance of cultural institutions and their role in providing a complete educational experience.

The Art Centre’s aim of reviving cultural knowledge of stone tools helps to provide a more complete picture of how Samoans were able to enhance the quality of life using stone adzes, perhaps the most important tool extensively used in traditional Samoan society; for house construction, assorted wooden products such as the tanoa (ceremonial bowl), and fishing and ocean voyaging canoes.

This development aspect of material culture was highlighted by United Nations Resident Coordinator Mr. Themba Kalua in his opening remarks. Ms.  Epifania Suafoa-Taua’i, the first speaker, shared when and how she became Samoa’s first female archaeologist with studies carried out at the University of Hawaii in Hilo in the 1980s.

Epi, as she is known, is from the village of Leone in American Samoa. She and her husband Laloasi Ioane Taua’i were instrumental in obtaining access to Tataga Matau, ancient adze quarry located on a ridge inland from the Leone. The site was visited last week by a group comprising the Director of the Museum of Stone Tools in Armidale, Australia, and students at the University of New England there. Others included heritage artists from Samoa who returned to Samoa with a higher level of respect and admiration for the strength and skill of their ancestors.

Mr. Warren Warbrick, a heritage artist of Toi Warbrick, a descendent of Rangitāne, an iwi (tribe) of Manawatu in New Zealand, started his presentation with the blowing of a pūtatara (shell trumpet), which he did three times. He spoke about his work, some fine examples of which he brought to Samoa to exhibit on International Museum Day and at the seminars and workshops to be held at Tiapapata through to the end of this week.

Virginia Warbrick shared information on Samoan artifacts held at Te Manawa Museum in Palmerston North where she and her husband Warren live. A number of these artifacts are stone adzes.   

Professor Mark Moore’s presentation was titled “Teaching and Restoring the Past – 3D models and the Museum of Stone Tools.” With a particular focus on Archaeology and Palaeoanthropology, Professor Moore also took time to discuss how stone may be shaped into an adze using reduction sequence analysis. As he presented, his students from the University of New England 3D modeled an adze brought to the symposium by Ms. Suela Meredith-Cook who, together with her husband, the late Richard Cook, have collected a large number of adzes found on their Malaefono Plantation in Saleimoa. The adzes range in size from 40mm to over 300mm.  

PhD student Georgina Kruger adjusts the position of an adze being photographed by UNE student Mary Anne Stone for the creation of a 3D model.

Organisers of the event invited participants to the next public session which will be on Tuesday 21 May and will mark World Day for Cultural Diversity for Dialogue and Development. Starting at 3:00pm, the event will include some practical exercises to give participants an opportunity to work with stone. The making of paper using plant and tree fibres will also be featured during the event.