Nina Tonga

Biography

Art historian Nina Tonga is Curator Contemporary Art at Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa. Previously, she was the inaugural Curator Contemporary Pacific Art (2017–2019) and Curator Pacific Cultures (2014–2017) at the museum.

Tonga specialises in contemporary Pacific art and visual culture, with a particular focus on gender, representation and the connections and intercultural relationships between Pacific Island nations and diaspora communities within a local and global context. She is from the villages of Vaini and Kolofo’ou in the Kingdom of Tonga.

Her curatorial projects for Te Papa include Mataaho Collective: Te Puni Aroaro (2022–2023) and Robin White: Te Whanaketanga | Something is Happening Here (2022–2023) (co-curated with Sarah Farrar), a major retrospective developed in partnership with Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tāmaki. Her solo exhibitions include projects by Lemi Ponifasio (2020), Nike Savvas (2019) and Chiharu Shiota (2020). Other notable exhibitions include Tonga ‘i Onopooni (2014), Pataka Art + Museum; Home AKL (2012), Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tāmaki; Tīvaevae: Out of the Glory Box (2015); and Pacific Sisters: Fashion Activists (2018–2019) at Te Papa. She also curated To Make Wrong/ Right/ Now, the second international Honolulu Biennial (2019).

Tonga has written for numerous journals and publications and was co-editor of Robin White: Something is Happening Here (Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tāmaki and Te Papa Press, 2022) and Home AKL: Artist of Pacific Heritage in Auckland (Auckland City Art Gallery, 2012).

Tonga earned a BA, MA and PhD in Art History from the University of Auckland (2006, 2007 and 2022, respectively).

Born in 1983 in Auckland, she lives and works in Wellington, Aotearoa [New Zealand].