Tame Iti unveils a sculpture, gifting it to Waitangi. Photo: Anneke Smith
Tame Iti made a splash at the Waitangi Treaty Grounds on Monday morning in a display that was part pōwhiri, part art piece.
Hundreds of supporters dressed in white and bearing white flags, marched across the Treaty Grounds.
Iti said he was amazed by the number of people who responded to his call to come to Waitangi.
Māori need to be smarter about how they protest, even if that means breaking some pōwhiri rules, he said.
"We don't have to do the same old, same old thing, we have to be more creative. It's an artists approach, that's our role, we are the storytellers. There's no rules to it."
Iti gifted a sculpture named Ngā Tamatoa to Waitangi.
The work he made pays tribute to the protest group of the same name that Iti was a part of, it is also engraved with the words of the late Moana Jackson.
Hundreds of protesters arrive at Waitangi for Tame Iti's white flag protest. Photo: RNZ / Pokere Paewai
Iti's grandson said their pōwhiri this morning broke a lot of rules by design.
Te Rangi Moaho Iti led the wero, the challenge at the pōwhiri, a job he said he had no choice but to take.
"I don't have an option ... being Tame Iti's mokopuna, all of us mokopuna's don't really have an option but it seems like they push me out the most."
The group came on to the marae bearing white flags, Te Rangi Moaho Iti explained their significance.
"We call it a Haki Ātea. The ātea comes from the separation of Ranginui and Papatuānuku, and when they separated there was an ātea a blank canvas, and so that is what the white flag represents a blank canvas to find new ways to move forward, to start again."
Tame Iti standing beside the sculpture named Ngā Tamatoa which he gifted to Waitangi. Photo: Pokere Paewai
