Gottfried Lindauer in New Zealand

Ana hadn’t been too happy about posing. She thought, as did some other Māoris, that to make a picture of someone was to insult someone’s atua or spirit.

– From the narration

It took him about two to three weeks to do one portrait. He used only the best canvas and top class oils. And it became the done thing to have your portrait painted by Gottfried Lindauer.

– From the narration

I am of the Ngāti Porou tribe. I have come here to lament over the great men of other days, the people before us coloured as if they were living. Pleasing to the eye is the shadow-carving of the European artist — it is as if they had all risen from the dead. Thankful are we to the man who has preserved these pictures of our elders, our old chiefs, as a treasure for the years to come.

– Apirana Ngata, in a gallery visitor's book, 1901

In his ear he [Tukukino] wears a huia’s head, a sign of very high rank indeed. It’s quite surprising really, just how much the Māoris trusted and respected Lindauer. Many towns around New Zealand still held their stockades and armed forces at the alert …

– From the narration