Page 32 - IB Sept-Oct 2020

Fiji@50 Fiji@50

LOSING THE ARTS IS TO LOSE OUR SOUL

By Ariela Zibiah Thomas emerged soon after, collectively capturing in their
early works, lived experiences in an infant nation grappling
The arts have clearly shaped Fiji’s trajectory these last with socio-economic and political realities of a multi-ethnic
50 years but have the arts and our creative industries been and culturally diverse society. These writers were products of
afforded agency to flourish and continue their critical role a school system that complemented academic pursuits with
in nation-building and nurturing? Have we as a nation done practiced creativity. An English Teachers Association, but in
enough to protect and support it as an essential element of particular Brother Theophane and Ethel Naidu, were masters
our society? The arts, regardless of its form, gives soul to our of steering multiple schools into drama and music festivals
existence, encoding our identity and way of life, recording year in and year out.
the present while nourishing our collective memory. In Suva, while the Fiji Arts Club had opened its doors in
Historians estimate that the Fiji Islands were not peopled the 1940s to cater for interest of members of the colonial
until some 3500 years ago. The ancestors of the Fijians were expatriate community, a more inclusive Fiji Arts Council was
referred to as Lapita people, because of their distinctive established in 1964 to promote and develop all forms of art.
pottery. Subsequent tracing and archaeological forays in Fiji The Fiji Museum opened her doors in 1955. The University of
have, without fail, revealed some of the most intricate and the South Pacific’s Oceania Centre for Arts, Culture and Pacific
decorated pottery shards and jewellery. Studies was established in 1997, with the late Tongan scholar
In 1953, Paul Wingert wrote in Art of the South Pacific and academic Professor Epeli Hau’ofa as its first director.
Islands: “Oceania art reveals a close relationship between Hau’ofa and the Centre were incubators, playing the critical
form and content, so close in fact that some knowledge of its role of nurturing Pacific thought and the performance of its
cultural background is necessary before it can be understood. art.
It was indeed one of the basic facets of their culture and was Semisi Maya, an incredibly gifted visual artist (realism)
closely interrelated with their social customs, religious beliefs despite the crippling effect of leprosy on both his hands, had
and economic practices”. a solo exhibition in London in June 1967 at the Bond Street
Galleries, firmly placing visual arts on the Fijian heritage
Creativity in our nation-building decades landscape. Born in 1917, Maya was from Cautata village in Tai-
There is purpose in our creations. Artisans borrow from a levu, and his subjects and seascapes, flowers and landscapes
collective memory which they themselves then enrich with featured in some of Fiji’s early postage stamps. Maya could
their own transfer of knowledge and skills. Our chants and not hold a brush, and used his knuckles and the stumps of his
dance, our taboos and even in traditional sports: learning fingers, aided by hair on his forearm to complete his largely
and knowledge transfer was key to our survival. Implicit in tempera-based realism pieces.
creations are beneficiaries, for whom the use of a bowl or a Social commentary through satire was provided by Laisenia
mat with distinct design, speaks of a moment in a personal Naulumatua over four decades. His stunning cartoons with his
journey or of an extension of important relationships. signature cat published mainly by The Fiji Times was aptly
Our creations are of great value, our wealth, iyau, albeit referenced by Fiji poet Sudesh Mishra (2016) as “cartooning
opposed to the largely held views of the arts as aesthetics or history”. His 1987 illustration of a gravestone engraved with
simply decorative. The arts regardless of form, is fundamen- RIP Fiji: the way the world should be to mark the first coup
tally a story, it gives voice to life experiences and are indica- d’état remains one of his most referenced pieces. A freelance
tors of intent, in politics or in the personal. The creative illustrator, Naulumatua’s interest and passion manifested sa-
industry gave and continues to give voice to the imagination. tirically on pertinent issues of national importance of the day
It interprets life, living, people and situations. Our creative including political development, faith, accountability of duty
industry records our present, with all its angst and joy: with- bearers, policy development and gender.
out it, we lose our stories and much more. The first South Pacific Festival of Arts hosted by Fiji in
Post-colonial Fiji was a heterogenous, thriving community 1972 underlined that the arts defined us, from progeny to
which benefitted immensely from the Nadi Airport which practice. The festival was reportedly the largest gathering
was open and operating by 1942. The airport was a portal the region had ever witnessed as 18 nations represented by
that brought both visitors and their quirks, especially their about 4000 performers converged to celebrate their incredibly
fashions. During Fiji’s most formative years, between 1951 rich cultural heritage in different forms: traditional, literary,
and 1975, Pandit Kamla Prasad Mishra stamped himself as an visual and/or performance art. The festival entrenched Manoa
influencer through his powerful poetry and as a journalist. Rasigatale’s place in the performance art realm. Rasigatale
Mishra’s verses covered all aspects of life here and his nation who had studied theatre in Australia was already performing
of birth, India. Mishra recorded the deaths of Ratu Sir Lala internationally in the mid-60s as a singer. The first Fijian to
Sukuna and Ratu Sir Edward Cakobau, Fiji’s independence appear on the Sydney Opera House stage and on Australian
and natural disasters. Jo Nacola, Vilisoni Hereniko and Larry television, he was voted one of the best actors in Australia in

32 Islands Business, September/October 2020