This transcript, condensed from a film of about an hour's length, records an interview that took place on January 18, 2004 at Alcheringa Gallery in Victoria, British Columbia, Canada. Ake Lianga is an indigenous artist from the Solomon Islands; Elaine Monds is Director of Alcheringa Gallery, which represents his work.

ELAINE: Ake Lianga came to Canada from the Solomon Islands in 1996 after winning a Commonwealth Scholarship to study art. He met and married Diane, and they now live here in Victoria, British Columbia. We've been privileged to work with Ake since his graduation from North Island College in Courtenay, BC. He has so far participated in two solo exhibitions at Alcheringa Gallery, and is preparing for another in May of this year. Ake has been invited to attend the annual conference of the Association of Social Anthropologists of Oceania in February of 2004. At this point it's not clear whether Ake will be able to attend in person, so to ensure that his voice is heard, we are recording this interview now.

Ake, you have a wide knowledge of the stories from your culture. This must be fairly unusual these days. How were you fortunate to learn so much?

AKE: Our society has what we call a "wantok" system, where relatives share everything. I was fortunate, during my childhood, to spend a lot of time with my elders and to be curious about their stories. I was the only one that would hang out with my grandparents; we would go out fishing, and I was always with them.

ELAINE: I understand that you were always interested in expressing yourself artistically. You come from a major carving tradition. Did you learn to carve as a child?

AKE: Yes. Growing up surrounded by elders that carve, in a village where traditional activities are strongly practiced, carving is part of daily life. Back then toys were very unusual. You might know someone who would go to town and buy a toy for their kids, but we didn't have access to a shop. We sneaked into the kitchen and borrowed Mum's knife, then ran out into the bushes and started carving things, like little canoes and cars.

ELAINE: When did you decide that you wanted to do more than carve?

AKE: When I went to school in Honiara and was introduced to paper and coloured pencils. Most of the artwork I saw in town was paintings and drawings. I also had a teacher there from New Zealand who influenced me to get into other things and to pursue my potential as an artist. My previous years were nothing but trouble in class. I was always scribbling all over the place- anywhere I could find empty space.

ELAINE: Were there any institutions for formal art training in Honiara?

AKE: There were basic courses on how to paint and draw for fun, but not any kind of formal institution.

ELAINE: When you were working in Honiara after you left school, were you part of a community of artists?

AKE: I was involved as a member of the Artists' Association of the Solomon Islands for a number of years. We would create exhibitions and try and promote the art itself- the tribal aspect of it. I also encouraged the art community and the artists who were eager to learn.

ELAINE: Early in your career you became interested in mural painting. How did that come about?

AKE: I apprenticed after I left school. The person who ran one of the t-shirt printing companies did some commissioned murals to go around the city. So I had the chance to work with him at that time and that began my interest in doing murals. I worked in collaboration with other artists through the Artists' Association of the Solomon Islands. We were quite well known in the city. [Then] I was commissioned to do a couple of murals on my own, and people started to know who I am.

ELAINE: And did you use traditional themes for those?

AKE: Yes, they were mostly based on traditional themes.

ELAINE: Was it around that time that you started participating in international exhibitions?

AKE: That's right. The first was held in 1995 at the University of New South Wales in Sydney. Artists came from all over the South Pacific to participate. During that time I not only had the chance to meet other artists, but also to experience the potential in presenting my own work, in representing my culture.

ELAINE: There must have been a wide, informed audience, too.

AKE: That's right. A curator from the Tjibaou Centre in New Caledonia bought one of my pieces, and I was very happy about that. I was really nervous going there among all these well-known South Pacific artists: I felt I was up there!

ELAINE: Winning a Commonwealth Scholarship is a really rare achievement. How did you discover that it even existed?

AKE: In 1996, my mum found an article in the newspaper that everyone was passing around and brought it home with her.

ELAINE: Why did you choose to study in Canada?

AKE: I met one of the former instructors at the Solomon Islands College of Higher Education who was in the Solomons on a cultural exchange, and she told me about Canada.

ELAINE: Studying art here must have been quite different from studying it in Honiara.

AKE: When I went to college, I had to put aside the traditional style of work I'm used to and to immerse myself in the theory and practice of modern Western art. It was quite a learning process for me; it allowed me to grow by experimenting in different media and seeing how they can work with my tribal art.

I'm very fortunate to have learned from other artists I went to school with. I met a native student who carves, David Jacobson Hunt, and from him I learned about local woods. We had an exhibition together, called Two Islands; it helped a lot of people to realize that there are close similarities between our cultures.

ELAINE: You've only returned to the Solomons on one occasion since you left, in a time of turmoil [2002]. It must have been very upsetting for you to go back to your country under those conditions.

AKE: It was a shocking experience. I remembered what the country, my home, was like before I left; when I came back it was totally demolished. It ruined the lifestyle of society. Most of all I was saddened to see young people growing up knowing only violence.

When I made a trip to the cultural centre itself, I saw all the totem poles, all the precious commissioned pieces, lying all over the place, chopped and demolished. It saddened me that society nowadays doesn't have any regard for its own historic values. I felt that I had to take responsibility and show the traditions in some other way that would keep them strong. That's the role I play as an artist, and I hope that's the way other artists see themselves when they produce their work.

ELAINE: Let's talk a bit about your next show and the theme that you've chosen and why.

AKE: After my last exhibition two years ago, I had difficulty coming up with an idea for my next one. It took me a while to come to the point where I realized I had to do something more outside my own background, which I think will tell people who know my work that it now has a broader content.

Most of the exhibition will focus on the shark. Shark is my totem, and it plays a very important role in all the cultures in the Solomons. Different islands have unique rituals or stories about sharks.

ELAINE: It was the basis of social exchange, wasn't it, in the early days?

AKE: That's right. It's a very strong thing to revive... because it's a thing that you can't really ignore.

ELAINE: Surely what the contemporary art scene in the Pacific is all about is making threatened culture become relevant again to the people who live there: that's certainly what's happened here on the Northwest Coast.

AKE: That's right. For us, people who live on the coast, shark is like the afterlife experience: they believe that whenever a person dies, a fisherman dies, their soul continues to dwell inside the shark.

I've been working on a piece called The Shark God. It's a mythical human form that comes from a different part of the Solomons. For the exhibition I'll have shark pieces from many different parts of the Solomons.

ELAINE: So the shark is represented differently on different islands?

AKE: People communicate with the shark in different ways. There's one part of the Solomons where the chief goes out on the water and starts calling to the shark god, whereby the shark comes up to him. Rituals can be taken to extremes, where they even sacrifice humans for the purpose of appeasing the sharks.

When I first thought of the show's theme, I didn't really realize how important the practice of shark worship was and the ceremony that was involved. It has been dying out. This exhibition will hopefully help bring back the memories of what actually happened years ago.

ELAINE: Will it make the shark a little more acceptable to Westerners, most of whom are terrified of it?

AKE: Well, I was a bit concerned about that when I thought of the subject. Western culture sees the shark as a monster of the sea, but to us it's not- and that's the truth.

ELAINE: When you're going to create a piece of art, do you have the concept of the whole piece beforehand, or is it something that develops in the process of creation?

AKE: I base my work on an original piece that was done by an ancestor a hundred years ago, and then bring it to the next step: it's the same idea in a different form. My work comes from the mythology and the stories that I heard during my childhood days, and when I produce it I try to let myself be very spontaneous.

ELAINE: Ake, thank you so much for telling us about your work!

AKE: Thank you! I'm always happy to discuss it.