Shigeyuki kihara biography books

Shigeyuki Kihara is a multimedia and performance artist who uses photography to explore themes of Pacific culture, identity, indigenous spirituality, colonialism, stereotypes, gender roles, and consumerism. Kihara was born in Samoa and is of Japanese and Samoan descent. She lives in Aotearoa/New Zealand.

Inspiration for Kihara's work comes from a variety of sources, including nineteenth- and early twentieth-century colonial photographs made by non-indigenous artists who contributed to perceptions—many of them erroneous—about Pacific Islanders and their culture.

In the Black Sunday series, Kihara chooses to rework historical photographs and postcards into collages that are rephotographed. In Gossip Sessions and Show No Evil, Kihara clothes young women who were typically pictured naked. In Distressed Maiden she transforms the stereotypical theme of the "dusky maiden," the subject of a multitude of colonial images. The woman seen in Tasi ae afe: One but a Million wears the Biography books for 4th graders.