Museums (THE_5282); New Zealand (NZ); Vanuatu (VU);

The Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa has alarge collection of Pacific material, but, despite themuseum’s commitment to represent the cultures of allNew Zealand’s peoples and its recognition of theimportance of intangible heritage, it has only been partiallysuccessful in demonstrating. Objects have been decontextualisedand some of their cultural significance hasbeen lost, as has happened with many other Pacificcollections in museums worldwide. The exhibition CultureMoves! Dance Costumes of the Pacific was set up tocomplement the conference Culture Moves! Dance inOceania for hiva to hip hop held at Te Papa in November2005. It provided an opportunity for the museum to show itscommitment to the idea of intangible heritage. The paperdeals with the problems involved in the collection, displayand interpretation of dance costumes and describes someof the solutions. It recommends the approach of theVanuatu Culture Centre’s Fieldworkers to the collectionand recording of intangible material as a model which TePapa tried to follow in the creation of this exhibition and asone that would be appropriate for other projects and othermuseums.