“The Coming of the Light”: Privileging Indigenous Beliefs

Abstract

Before the Coming of the Light there was darkness. Polynesian beliefs refer to this time as Po, night, when the earth mother and sky father were joined, before their children separated them and the world was flooded by light (Ao). It was then that the world as we know it was brought into existence; it was then that the oral traditions and cultures of the peoples of the Pacific were created. The passage from darkness to light (Po ma te ao) is reenacted daily. For most island cultures, a liminal space exists in the unknown time between night and day. It is within this space that ritual takes place, creative endeavor is acknowledged, and our past and present are unified. It is within this space that the art of Lily Laita, Ellen Jose, and Niki Hastings-McFall functions.The contrast between light and dark, white and brown is utilized by each in her art practice. They use the antagonism between the antipodes; the contrast of white and brown; and the polarity of night and day as a means of exploring issues of cultural imperialism and its legacy. Issues of difference are addressed through the juxtaposition of various cultural readings of similar symbols. These echo the discrepant ideologies of Pacific peoples and Christian missionaries in the nineteenth century when each group used the phrase “the coming of the light.”