Isiaha Te Rangatira Barlow: Fire, Knowledge, and Creation: Māui & Prometheus in Conversation / 6 Dec 2025 – 3 May 2026

Isiaha Te Rangatira Barlow, (Ngāpuhi, Ngāti Tahu-Ngāti Whaoa, Ngāti Uenuku), The Birth of Māui [detail] 2025, tempera, gold leaf & gesso on board. Courtesy of the artist.

Isiaha Te Rangatira Barlow’s exhibition Fire, Knowledge, and Creation: Māui and Prometheus in Conversation intersects the worlds of Māui and Prometheus, connecting the two mythical figures via shared themes and historically rich narratives.

Maui and Prometheus are remembered for stealing fire- a transformative act that humanises their divine achievements and casts them into our histories as trickster figures. Barlow recontextualises the stories of Maui and Prometheus by conveying their stories in a more intuitive manner and purposefully changing how they are classically depicted.

Barlow painstakingly constructs his compositions as immaculately painted pieces; inspired by reading text, quickly sketched out from the initial impression and then meticulously painted layer by layer until finally they are revealed. His process is quietly intensive and unique in Aotearoa. The figures conjured in these dream-scape settings are draped in vibrant colour. There are subtle stylistic imports from Byzantine art such as how hands are posed or where the figures are looking, and other minute details.
Each painting is a doorway into a mythological world, a sensory depiction from a time where gods and forces of the natural world were synergised. A complex layering of social belief systems is presented, but with an underlying mischievous tone. Religion during medieval times, where transitional belief systems were put through a cultural milieu, saw the rise of Byzantine art in all its resplendent beauty. This is an era before the weight of architecture imposed a vanishing point and the demands of perspective influenced the rise of naturalism within painting.
The juxtaposition of Christian iconography with Pagan themes has been disrupted by Māui narratives. The abstract nature of Barlow’s painting style mirrors this world but skews it through a contemporary lens with an umbilical cord to Te Āo Māori and in doing so, sets his work apart. With limited pigments, tempera and indulgent splurges of gold, silver and copper, Barlow unravels 16 mysterious scenes for viewers’ consideration and asks that we revisit the stories of Māui and Prometheus; the histories told and untold.

Cecelia Kumeroa

Curator