Carl FK Pao with Constellation Pasifika. Photo by James Giggacher.
A visually stunning mural is painting a different picture of the Pacific and recasting our ideas about identity, writes JAMES GIGGACHER. Stand back and soak it in: the cool marine breeze, the sun-sparkled endless blue of the world's largest ocean, the Pacific. But while that canvas may conjure the picture-perfect vision of island dreaming, there's another view to take in: a new mural at ANU that is stripping away our postcard idea of Oceania and revealing the deeper currents that make up the region. The mural is the work of celebrated contemporary hawaiian artist Carl FK Pao, the inaugural Pacific Studies Artist in Residence at the ANU College of Asia and the Pacific. Pao, who teaches art by day and moonlights as a visual artist once the school bell rings, says that the mural is meant to challenge preconceived notions about the many peoples, places and cultures that make up the Pacific. "Coming here as the inaugural artist in residence, I didn't want to do art that was all about me," says Pao. "I really wanted my time as a resident to be meaningful and to interact with the community.
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