Rangi Kipa

A dear friend and talented artist

Rangi Kipa holds a special place in the heart of Unity Collection's owner Tania Rupapera as he's a lifelong friend of many talents and a proud godparent to Tania's son, Wiremu. Both hailing from Taranaki, Tania and Rangi share a common love for creating or in Tania's case, curating, art from the local area.

Rangi has designed kākahu specifically for (and exclusive to) Unity Collection, and has even skillfully designed the signwriting for Unity's car. Through his education in Māori studies and anthropology at Waikato University and explorative travel overseas to strengthen his ancestral design languages and technical mastery, Rangi has managed to achieve fluency in a range of art forms and materials.

Art, Sculptures and More

Rangi kipa has reawakened Ātiawa carving

Rangi Kipa is one of Aotearoa's talented Māori sculpture artist extraordinaire, reknowed for crafting New Plymouth's airport terminal with the story of the Te Atiawa ancestor Tamarau, and winning a gold award for doing so. 

Continuously pushing his own boundaries and exploring his creativity deeper in his work, Rangi has even reawakened the Ātiawa serpentine carving style, which hasn't been practised since the nineteenth century.

While primarily a sculptor, carver and tā moko artist, Rangi's practice explores the articulation of tribal and cultural identity through ethnographic taonga. 

An excerpt from Rangi Kipa himself:

"Our art forms are languages and play a fundamental role in the transmission of our knowledge systems and our identity. As dream weavers and sages, our job is to be activists and protagonists and propose alternatives to our present realities because most of our present reality is sculpted by the West and in many ways we are responsible for purging ourselves of what we don’t need, what doesn’t serve us anymore."

EXCLUSIVE TO UNITY

These incredibly intricate and creative designs on the t-shirts, long-sleeves and hoodies that Rangi Kipa has so carefully crafted are called "UNITY" and the art reflects just that - unity. 

We are so fortunate to have been able to collaborate with Rangi to craft collectable kākahu that's exclusively available at Unity Collection. His designs are extremely popular, often selling out quickly, there's a demand for Rangi's talent throughout Aotearoa.