Jessica Palalagi was born in Aotearoa/New Zealand and traces her ancestry to Niue/Nukututaha in Te Moananui a Kiwa and Aberdeen, Scotland.  She has an MA in Art History from Auckland University and is the Kaiwhakahaere/GM of the Arts Foundation Te Tumu Toi.  She is a founding member of In*ter*is*land Collective, she writes, sometimes has the patience to draw, makes little moving images, and is in love with trying to create expansive and immersive works. A Gemini sun, she’s obsessed with the duality of all things, but ironically is terrified of doppelgangers. She is made of the saltiness of all moanas spanning hemispheres, the journeys that her ancestors navigated, the movements of dark to light made by the mahina, the languages that have been lost, the strength of the matriarchs before her and the music of Barry White. 

It's Matariki 2020, in London, summer - hot and sweaty.  My tan is tanning. I lounge daily by the blow up pool with about 10cm of water in it in the backyard.  Hours are spent between the yard, the lounge, the kitchen and my room.  Over and over and over again as we meander through lockdown.  I look great.  I feel like shit.  Panny D blues, my romance turned woemance and then nomance.  Worried about my parents, my sister, my famz flung around the world.  And our collective; together at MOKU, I could put my arms around them all.  Now we are separated by hemispheres. It was at Matariki that we decided to manifest a new end to an old Gregorian New Year.  As we reached out to each other through videos made in Whatsapp, telling each other how much we loved each other, what we saw, admired, adored and missed - these were the arms holding me.  The arms of the collective.  

— Jessice Palalagi, Artist Statement

The Water Tastes Different Here is on at Tautai Gallery till July 30 2022