In Conversation Yuki Kihara & Natalie King

Yuki Kihara is exceptionally creative, habitually outspoken and unassailable in addressing some of the most urgent issues of our times. In September 2019, we were appointed as the artist-curator duo for Aotearoa New Zealand at the 59th Venice Biennale, which has been delayed until 2022. Yuki is the first Sāmoan and Pasifika artist selected to represented Aoteroa New Zealand. Fortunately, I was able to visit Yuki’s studio in Upolu, Sāmoa in March 2020, prior to the COVID-19 lockdown. Since then, we have been working across times zones and waterways: Zooming, reading, exchanging, discussing and conversing. We paused to conduct this interview via email while Yuki was in an apartment in Auckland waiting to be repatriated back to Sāmoa, and I was at home in Melbourne.

Image credit: Yuki Kihara, Ulugali’i Samoa – Samoan Couple (From series Fa’afafine – In the Manner of a Woman), 2005 c-print

View PDF: VAULT Issue 32 – In Conversation Yuki Kihara & Natalie King