Karuna Douglas – “My work exists in the layers just below and just above the clay. It’s only microns thick but in that space, I can create a universe.”

Karuna Douglas is a multi-award-winning Indian ceramic artist and glaze specialist from Muriwai Beach. Though her work, she brings together ancestry and land; clay as memory, glaze as language. As a member of Ngā Kaihanga Uku, Karuna has been warmly embraced for her depth of craft and respect for tikanga, while being mentored by the late Colleen Waata Urlich. Since 2023, she has embarked on sharing, inspiring and guiding clay practitioners in understanding and mastering glazes.

“Spending three months bedridden after breaking my ankles, and then having the earth collapse around us during Cyclone Gabrielle made me acutely aware of how fragile life is, and that all the glaze knowledge I’ve accumulated is worthless if I don’t share it.”

Todd Douglas Ngāpuhi (Ngāti Manu, Te Mahurehure) Pākehā (Scottish, Welsh). Raised in a family of boat-builders, Todd’s hands learned craft early, shaping tools of the sea, then shaping forms of clay. He is primarily self-taught and his powerful hand-formed sculptures explore the transformation of materials, the meeting of land, fire and form. To work with clay is to be transformed by it; “You can’t force uku/clay. You have to allow it to change and become. And through that process, you come to learn and understand more about yourself”. A proud member of Ngā Kaihanga Uku, Todd has participated in a number of international indigenous artist hui and exchanges.

Rhonda Halliday Ngāpuhi, Te Uri Taniwha, Ngāti Hineira, Pākehā. Rhonda lives and works in Waipapa, north of Kerikeri where she runs her private work space Uku Toi Gallery and clay studio. She belongs to Te Taitokerau Māori Artists Collective and Ngā Kaihanga Uku of which they were co-founders. She was fortunate to study under Colleen Waata Urlich and Manos and completed a Bachelor of Applied Arts in Visual Arts from Northtec Whangārei in 2000. She is best known for highly burnished, smoke-fired clay pieces exploring rebirth and emergence. More recently, she has expanded into new forms and techniques, combining clay with mixed media to deepen her stories and prompt conversation and awareness. Rhonda has exhibited nationally and internationally and taken part in Toi Ngāpuhi exhibitions, indigenous cultural exchanges, and related events.

Taiao ora, he tangata ora — if the environment is well, the people are well.

Dorothy Waetford is a member of Ngā Kaihanga Uku Māori Clay workers Collective, Te Ātinga Contemporary Māori Visual Arts Committee, and Te Taitokerau Māori Arts Collective. After several years teaching at tertiary level, she worked at indigenous arts centres in the Northern Territory and Western Australia, and has since taken part in numerous international exhibitions and indigenous arts and cultural exchanges. Her enduring commitment to Māori arts and culture, expressed largely through voluntary work restoring connectivity and wellbeing for whenua and whānau, underpins her role as a board member for Toi Ngāpuhi, an advocacy agency supporting Ngāpuhi cultural and creative excellence across Te Taitokerau.