A proposed interactive public artwork will bring a piece of Pacific culture to Blenheim, honouring the 20,000 workers who are invited to New Zealand each year to support the horticultural sector under the RSE scheme.
Paererewā charitable trust is on a mission to create 1000 unique benches or ‘Pae’ around the country, each intended to last 1000 years. The artworks are designed to create spaces to pause, reflect, connect and provide a link to future generations.
The Blenheim Pae was designed in conjunction with Paererewā, Hatch Workshop and a group of 52 RSE workers in a collaborative session run by Hortus last year. Discussions and drawings centred on raised conversation platforms used in the workers’ home villages in Papua New Guinea, Fiji, Vanuatu and the Solomon Islands.
This encouraged Hatch designers Hannah Broatch and Mason Rattray to connect with Pacific architectural historian Mike Austin, who showed them different examples of the structure in his photographic archives.
The proposed Blenheim design is a concrete ‘Pae’ inspired by the pacific models, made to seat up to 10 people in conversation, which will be placed at a site near where the Taylor and Ōpaoa rivers meet. The site was chosen with mana whenua and approved with a resource consent by Marlborough District Council.
Sam Johnson, Paererewā General Manager and Trustee, says the Pae is designed to bring an element of home to Marlborough for Pacific workers, filling a gap that has long existed in the community.
“For years and years, RSE workers have come and played such a huge part of our economy. And one of the comments that they made was that they live in worker accommodation and they work their jobs, but they don’t have a space that’s uniquely theirs.”
Sam hopes that the project will create a space for connection and cultural resonance, while “putting the spotlight on the importance of and the love that the Marlborough community shows for RSE workers.”
“I think this is one of our favourites that we’re working on at the moment because it’s just so special. It’s grounded in a very special group of people who are perhaps often and not intentionally overlooked in New Zealand,” he adds.
Fundraising has opened for the Pae on the Paererewā website, with the team hoping to begin construction in December.
