Museum Stories - Otago

This is one of the iconic images that Otago Museum uses in its own promotional material. I took this photograph on a recent visit to the museum - it's the carving Poutokomanawa, in the museum's collection. According to the museum's notes, "the carved figues are of a tribal ancestor and ancestress in sexual embrace. This is a re-telling of one creation myth, the union of the primal parents, Rangi and Papa. One of their many children, Tane, the forest god, prised his parents apart, letting light into the world, where Rangi is the sky and Papa, the earth." www.otagomuseum.govt.nz