Manuahi: Trauma in the Bones
Contemporary Painting and Poetic Exhibition by Manuahi
6th – 30th June 2026
DEPOT Lounge
28 Clarence Street, Devonport
Exhibition Opening & Artist Talk:
Saturday June 6th, 2026, 2pm – 4pm
Content Notice: This exhibition includes references to mental health, suicide, and abuse (including sexual abuse), as well as visual nudity.
About the Exhibition
Trauma in the Bones, by Manuahi, brings visibility to the lived realities of queer, neurodivergent, and gender-diverse/transgender people: communities that experience disproportionately high rates of mental health distress, suicidality, and violence. These works speak from the body, from the bones, and from what has been carried in silence.
Through oil paintings and poetic word, Manu advocates art as therapy and testimony: unearthing shame, dysphoria, grief, isolation, and the ongoing experience of learning how to feel safe in a body society deems unworthy.
Trauma is not abstract here; it is lived, layered, and held with tenderness.
This exhibition is a call for dignity, care, and belonging. We are not invisible. We are your whānau, your community, your fellow humans, and we deserve safe, inclusive, and affirming support.
All proceeds donated to Gender Minorities Aotearoa– a trans-led organisation providing advocacy, housing, education, and peer support.
About the Manuahi
Manuahi (they/them) is a queer, neurodivergent, non-binary/agender, disabled artist and author– working at the intersections of art, poetry, ritual,
and embodiment.
Their multidisciplinary practice explores themes of our shared humanity, including grief, pain, mental health, trauma, healing, sacredness, beauty of nature, erotic innocence, and the wild power of the soul–inviting deeper resonance with the Earth, the body, and each other.
Rooted in somatic ritual, every creation is channeled prayer for wholeness and a reclamation of expression, with a deep commitment to healing and transformation. They create artwork that invokes emotion, asks us to face the parts of ourselves we are afraid to, and question social systems that represses and disadvantages those that don’t fit within the ‘norm’. Born in Hawai’i, currently live in Devonport, and looking forward to showing artwork for the first time in Tāmaki Makaurau.
June 6 @ 10:00 am – June 30 @ 4:00 pm
