Sara  (Hera) Tautuku Orme, (Ngāti Awa,Ngāti Tarāwhai, Te Arawa, Pakeha) based in Aotearoa New Zealand.

After completing a degree in Sociology, majoring in Feminist studies & Ethnicity, (Canterbury University 1987) she later went on to study photography (1993) with a focus on research, documentary and portrait photography.

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Sara   (Hera) Tautuku Orme has reclaimed the cameras ability to observe, turning it into an anti-colonial , anti patriarchal device, through creating works that celebrate her patrilineal heritage (Ngāti Awa,Ngāti Tarāwhai, Te Arawa) and matrilineal heritage, celebrating the histories of feminism. This action has been inspired by the way in which Orme’s life has been defined by the complexities of her own self-portrait: 

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Orme’s first pioneering project, This Is Not The Red Carpet, (1993) emerged from her  immersion of third wave feminism ain the 90's.

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Te Teko (2009- )has been a decade long and ongoing. Te Teko project began soon after the death of her Father ,and explores the small populated community of which himself, and five generations before them were born. 

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Responding to the life around her, Stroke,(or Ward DG)  gives light to her seventy nine year old mother, with so much vitality and intelligence, grappling with new life after her stroke. 

Orme’s work is both an investigation of sociological landscapes of both herself and those around her. Her community, feminism and family continue to be central to her work.

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Orme is currently working on  Ko au te awa, te awa ko au -I am the river and the river is me. 

The awa (river) is a toanga (treasure) towards identity and is the mauri (life force) of the indigenous people of Aotearoa, New Zealand. Our awa is the life giver of all things. It is water in its purest form and has the power to give life, sustain wellbeing and counteract evil. Ko Toku Awa- is part of an ongoing project exploring the spiritual connection with whenua (land), tupuna(ancestors) and wairua (spirit). Ko Toku Awa draws strongly on the complexity of colonialism in Aotearoa New Zealand, The Raupatu, (land theft) consequences of dislocation and assumes norms that are referenced from history, memory, and whenua (land) .

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