Intricate ink drawings of landscape and kahu / cloak forms based on Māori weaving and carving
John Bevan Ford (18 April 1930 – 16 September 2005) was a New Zealand Māori artist and educator who started exhibiting in 1966. He is a leading figure in contemporary Māori art with art held in all large public collections of New Zealand.[1] In 2005 Ford received the Creative New ZealandTe Waka Toi Kingi Ihaka Award.
Ford was born in 1930 in Christchurch, New Zealand. He is Māori and affiliated to the Ngāti Raukawa tribe.[2] He grew up in Christchurch although went to Wellington in his teenage years.[1]
He began exhibiting in 1966,[5] but at the same time he was an educator and taught at Hamilton Teachers’ College in the late 1960s to the early 1970s.[1]
In 1973 Ford was one of the people who was part of establishing the Māori Artists and Writers’ Association (Nga Puna Waihanga).[6]
He moved to Palmerston North and taught at Massey University, first in the University Extension Department on the adult education art courses.[7] In 1984 he took a lecturer position in Māori studies. He developed two Māori art papers, one on 'traditional' Māori art and the other on 'contemporary' Māori art. From these papers his successor Bob Jahnke established the Massey University’s Māori visual arts programme Toioho ki Āpiti, the first indigenous four-year fine arts degree programme anywhere in the world.[8][9]
In 1988 Ford retired from teaching and academia to focus on his art.[1]
Ford presented his work at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York through a series of lectures in 1990 (he was the first New Zealand artist to do so).[3]
Ford is mostly known for his ink drawings of landscape and kahu (cloak - traditional Māori weaving). His paintings have been seen world wide appearing in more than 20 solo exhibitions.[3] His paintings reference the Māori art forms of kōwhaiwhai (which are rafter paintings of a wharenui / Māori meeting house) and whakairo (Māori carving patterns).[5] Notable elements in his work are cloaks floating above significant landforms and pacific rim works where symbols from indigenous pacific rim countries are laid out against outlines of the land.[10] His use and research of kōwhaiwhai puts him alongside other contemporary Māori artists who also explored kōwhaiwhai in their art including Paratene Matchitt, John Hovell and Sandy Adsett. Pine Taiapa was someone who taught Ford in this area.[11] Cloaks are used by Ford in many of his artworks. This represents, 'ancestral lineage as well as sacred, collective and personal history...'.[12]
Ōwae marae gateway, Waitara
Notable carvings by Ford are the Gateway at Ōwae Marae, Waitara[13] and the Meeting House, Te Aroha o AohangainWairarapa.[14]
In the Raglan exhibition catalogue of Māori Artists of the South Pacific (1984) Ford said: "Even when not used directly, the proven symbols of the past provide models by which new symbols may be judged."[11]
John Bevan Ford was awarded the Creative New Zealand Te Waka Toi Kingi Ihaka Award (2005) in acknowledgement of his leadership and outstanding contributions to Māori art.[22]
^ abcdef"John Bevan Ford". Te Waka Toi Contemporary Maori Art from New Zealand. Resource Kit. Te Waka Toi (Council for Maori & South Pacific Arts). September 1992.
