Nathan Suniula

Nathan Suniula’s paintings deconstruct paradigms, while simultaneously revealing his own history. Samoan history and theoretical physics meet for the first time

Small green edges, 2005

 in Nathan’s artwork. Looking at the infinite nature of the universe and how it relates to the human mind, he creates fields of colour to express an infinite continuum that is part-science/part-personal history.

Nathan began using ie toga[i] as a way of looking back to his childhood in American Samoa. Dismantling the intricately woven fine mats and then painting it or dousing it in polyurethane to isolate it within fields of colour is part of Nathan’s commentary on the paradigm of Pacific Islands cultures verses Western society through representational abstraction.

Nathan paints nostalgic imagery representative of his Samoan culture. The performative production and gestural control of painting is a way of connecting to his childhood through replicating the weave of ie toga. Yet this process also alludes to his fascination with theoretical physics. Disrupted field 0.3 is an example of the meeting of these disjuncted paradigms – where the weaving of the ie toga complements the string theory as both are intricate and infinite history whether through genealogy or particles.

The mathematical arrangements of lines speak of vast grids of concrete metropolises as well as the networks of Samoan genealogy, family lines crossing, meeting, and parting.

White strings and red disruptions(detail), 2006

The subtly shifting tonalities of Small Green Edges represent steadiness in an infinite continuum. Over a coloured base, Nathan applies an inconsistent top layer of paint to draw attention to the impasto nature of the ‘skin’ of the painting. Within this notion of an infinite continuum, disruptions are inevitable and essential, these ‘events’ can be seen across the surface of Nathan’s paintings, crests and falls traverse the layered paint.

While this layer is wet, Nathan drags a nail or comb across the surface over and over again. The therapeutic process of creating grids and patterns is reflective of the Samoan ie toga and makes way for accidental discoveries the meetings and parting of lines.

Through his art, Nathan is connecting with memories from his

Blue strings 0.8' (detail) 2006

childhood in American Samoa, the cultural and religious upbringing that is such an important aspect of his life and fuels his artistic practice. Those memories are distant, not only because he is in New Zealand but because we idealise those childhood memories. This is what he craves to communicate, and this is why it is easy to become entranced in the soothing colours and incidental patterning across the fields of paint, he has tapped into something that reminds us of childhood, something everyone can identify with.  

[i] The highest-ranking item in the Samoan exchange system and greatly valued, the very finely woven ie toga are most often used for ceremonial gifts.