Kumutoto Stream

Local artist Kedron Parker created this: “I have created a site-specific sound installation at the top of Woodward Street in Wellington, on a popular walking route used by workers to access office buildings on the Terrace. The tunnel itself is tiled, bleak and bunker-like, and runs underground, directly beneath the Terrace. The soundscape in the tunnel imagines the area in its natural state, before development – just over 150 years ago – to evoke the experience of walking along the former Kumutoto Stream. Although it is not well known, Kumutoto Stream was an important feature of the area’s natural and social history. Today, it is buried under cement, but still flows to Wellington Harbour and supports fish in its pipes. I myself used to commute along the route of the stream, and I’ve found the tunnel to be a point of transition. Emerging onto the Terrace, I find myself entering a cement world that feels disconnected from its past, disconnected from nature, and makes me feel disconnected too. By creating a soundscape in the tunnel, it is my hope to awaken passers-by to the contrast between then and now, and the danger of how our built environments can rob us of our own vitality.”

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