Co-commissioned by Te Tuhi and The Physics Room in 2025, the group exhibition Dalosa, Lafo & Iva explores the relationships we hold with ourselves, our families, and the wider community through photography, sculpture, and installation.
The idea for this exhibition began in 2024 through conversations between curator James Tapsell-Kururangi and artist Edith Amituanai while working together on Te Tuhi’s artist development programme, Papatūnga. The exhibition was created to continue building pathways and opportunities for early-career Pasifika artists.
→ About the artworks
About the artists
Axel Iva
Axel Iva is a Samoan artist with bloodlines from Apolima, Iva, Salelavalu, and Salelologa, born and based in Māngere East, Tāmaki Makaurau. Iva’s creative practice involves craft and design, ranging from tactile techniques to technological applications. His exploration of semantics, semiotics and Samoan life catalyse his seriocomic pieces and concepts. Iva was a 2023 recipient of the Tautai Fale-ship artist's residency, during which he completed the series A’E, I.O.U, a 17-piece, mixed media homeware collection, indexed according to the Samoan alphabet.
Lolani Dalosa
Lolani Dalosa is a Samoan and Filipino artist and curator, raised in Tāmaki Makaurau. His father is from Eastern Samar in the Philippines, and his mother hails from the village of Lepea, Samoa. Dalosa is a co-founder of the South Auckland design and art collective ‘Raroboys’. His practice encompasses mixed media, design, printmaking, and photography. Dalosa is interested in cultural iconography, featuring recognisable characters and objects from his visual lexicon. Dalosa's most recent exhibitions include Character Studies, 2024 at Te Tuhi, and Someone's at The Door, 2023 at Papakura Art Gallery, and was included in Do Not Alter, 2021 at Corban Estate Arts Centre, and Cross My Heart, 2022 at The Nix. Dalosa was the recipient of the 2023 Oceanic Internship with Tautai and Te Uru, and curator of Raroboys Vol.3, 2024 at Studio One Toi Tū.
Ma'alo Lafo
Ma’alo Lafo is an artist hailing from the villages of Falealili & Taufusi. Raised in Tāmaki Makaurau, Lafo is a lens-based practitioner who documents his local community in Ōtara, friends and family. He is an active member of the South Auckland Photoclub, and was the recipient of the 2024 Vuli Tara Mentoring Programme with Moana Fresh.
About the curator
James Tapsell-Kururangi (Te Arawa, Ngāti Whakaue, Ngāti Pikiao, Ngāti Mākino, Tainui, Ngāti Raukawa, Ngāti Porou, Te Whānau-a-Rākairoa) is an artist, writer, and curator. Currently serving as a Director of The Physics Room, he previously held curatorial roles at Te Tuhi and Enjoy Contemporary Art Space. He graduated from Massey University with a Bachelor of Design (First Class Honours) specializing in photography in 2017 and a Master of Fine Arts (First Class Honours) in 2019. As an artist, James has exhibited in How to live together at ST PAUL St Gallery (2019), He waiata aroha at Enjoy Contemporary Art Space (2021), and Crossings at Adam Art Gallery (2021). His writing has been published in Lieu Journal, The Pantograph Punch, and by Gloria Books.