Janelle Hazeldine from Ohai, Southland won a $500 prize for her logo design in a competition for Te Tiaki Mahinga Kai. Her design depicts a guardian figure receding into the distance to form a landscape, representing how humans and the environment are interconnected. The guardian's arms form korus, with smaller korus representing resources taken from the land but guarded and replenished. The design symbolizes the balance of taking from and giving back to the land. The winning logo was selected by the Te Tiaki Mahinga Kai Forum and effectively captures the values of guardianship over natural resources.

1. Kai Körero December 2007
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A logo by Janelle Hazeldine, from Ohai in
Southland, was the winning entry in our
logo competition. Entries were invited from
University and Wänanga design schools. The
winning entry was selected by the Te Tiaki
Mahinga Kai Forum gathered at Önuku Marae
on 12th and 13th November. Janelle won a
$500 prize for her wonderful design. We would
like to thank all those that entered and wish
you all luck in your careers as designers.
I was born in Invercargill and raised in the coal mining
town of Ohai, in Western Southland. I was educated
at Ohai Primary and Central Southland College. I have
always enjoyed being creative, and so it was only
natural that I became immersed in the arts, completing a
Bachelor of Fine Arts at Otago Polytechnic in 2006. I am
building on this with two more years of Design Studies at
the University of Otago (finishing at the end of 2008).
While design is often considered irrelevant, it confronts
us everywhere in our daily lives: from advertising, to
food packaging, to merely brightening up the world we
live in. It also doesn't happen in a void, yet rather is
created through process and time. My design for Te Tiaki
Mahinga Kai went through these inevitable stages.
I wanted my design to embody the many values of Te
Tiaki Mahinga Kai while still delivering an instant and
efficient message. The Forum's value of guardianship
over the land is shown through a figure slowly receding
into the distance to form a landscape of rolling hills
or mountains. This literally shows that the land and
people are one, and if we hurt the environment we
are at the same time hurting ourselves – our future.
Mäori have always had a great reverence for the land,
seeing it as sacred, referring to it as Papatuanuku or
earth mother. The guardian's arms are formed by Koru.
Stemming from the Koru or guardian's arms are smaller
Koru of which resemble things taken from the land, yet
monitored, guarded and even released back to replenish
or replace what was initially taken or borrowed. The
design is equivocal in showing the cycle of both taking,
yet replacing the aspects us as people have borrowed.
It reinforces the fact that the pendulum shouldn't swing
one way, and that when we take we must too, give back.
Janelle Hazeldine
Janelle's logo displays our kaupapa
Nice one Janelle. I'd say this is a distinctive
mark for a really interesting project. It presents
quite a few possibilities and yet has some
unity about it. It's a skill to create that kind of
assymetrical open-ended flow but maintain
the balance of parts. And the shapes have an
organic quality which works well. I'd be proud
of it.
- Alex Gilks, Kai Körero designer