Show Notes
A lovely conversation with Sara Orme about her journey in photography and her forthcoming publication, Kaumāua. From her website:
Sara Tautuku Orme (Ngāti Awa, Ngāti Tarawhai, Ngāti Whakaue – Te Arawa) is a Tāmaki Makaurau-based photographer and social documentarian with a background in sociology and kaupapa Māori storytelling. Her work explores whakapapa, Māori identity, mana motuhake, and the enduring impacts of colonisation, often through intimate portraiture and oral histories.
Sara has been exploring whanaungatanga through her lens for over two decades. Her work has been exhibited in Aotearoa, Australia, and New York, and is held in public collections such as Waikato Museum.
Her most recent kaupapa, Kaumātua, records and preserves the kōrero whaiaro and mātauranga of Māori elders across Aotearoa. Rooted in tikanga and story sovereignty, the work combines large-format photographic portraiture with Māori oral histories.
She has exhibited at Te Papa, Caelum Gallery (New York), and Blindside (Melbourne), and in 2025 contributed to He Waka Eke Noa at Tim Melville Gallery. She has twice been recognised by the Contemporary New Zealand Art Awards (2022, 2023), receiving a national award for her photographic work. Her forthcoming book, Kaumātua Aotearoa, will be published by Auckland University Press in 2026.
Born in Ōtautahi, with whakapapa to Te Teko and Rotorua, Sara has lived in Tāmaki Makaurau for over 30 years, where she raised her tamariki and now her mokopuna. At home she is known as Sara, but on her marae, Ruaihona, in Te Teko, she is Hera — or, as some affectionately say, “the blonde.”
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More from Conversations with NZ Photographers
Hi, I’m Andy Spain, a commercial photographer and artist from Wellington, I interview photographic artists from Aotearoa / New Zealand. If you want to check out my work go to andyspain.nz and follow me on instagram at andyspain_photography.
Welcome to Conversations with New Zealand Photographers. I’m Andy Spain, a photographer from Wellington Aotearoa / New Zealand. I work with architects and others in that area photographing completed projects in the urban environment.
Welcome to Conversations with New Zealand Photographers. My name's Andy Spain. I'm an architectural photographer based in based in Wellington, Aotearoa, New Zealand. I work with architects and developers and construction companies and lots of other people involved in the architecture sector, photographing finished projects and the urban environment in general. This last weekend's been a great weekend in Te whanganui a tara Wellington with the Photo Book New Zealand Festival taking place, where people from all over the world have come to show photo books and meet up with photographers that you don't often get the chance to speak to. I had the opportunity to meet with two photographers to record a podcast, and the first one I'm dropping is the one with Erin Lee Photography, who has produced two incredible books that caught my eye at the festival. One was The Crimson Thread, and the other one was Legal Fiction. Both of them investigate the ongoing effects of colonization in Australia. She's originally from Rangiora in Otautahi Christchurch, but she moved to Australia. And they're just such beautiful books, full of depth and content and intelligence. she gave a talk as part of the festival, and I spoke to her after that. So, do like and subscribe and tell people to listen and check out ErinLeePhotography.com and AndySpain.nz, and follow us on Instagram, and I hope you enjoy this conversation which I recorded this morning on the 10th of August at Te Matapehi in Wellington. Thanks. Bye. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
A great conversation with Kate van der Drift. Cameraless Photography. Waikato. Raglan, Aotearoa, New Zealand, Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Thanks for listening to this episode of conversations with New Zealand photographers. I’m recording this intro on the 4th May 2026