Nō te kohu ahau · Tūhoe · Aotearoa

Weaving mythologies that whakamana the whenua and its waters.

Through the lens of film, music, word and acts of fierce love.

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Ko Maungapōhatu te maunga

Ko Waikaremoana te moana

Ko Ohinemataroa te awa

Ko Mataatua te waka

Ko Tāneatua tōku tīpuna

Ko Tūhoe tōku iwi

Ko Urewera tōku hapū

Ko Tōtara tōku marae

Nō te kohu ahau

Ko Timothy Firkin tōku ingoa

Maungapōhatu
Te Kaupapa
Three instruments · One weaving

We are not separate from the land, the water, or each other; only forgotten.

This work is a poetic rhythmic rebellion against that forgetting: film, music and word in service of remembrance.

Whatungarongaro te tangata, toitū te whenua

As man disappears from sight, the land remains.

Ake ake ake
Ohinemataroa
Te Mahi
The Work

Fifteen years behind the camera.

Director of photography across two seasons of Stolen Lands, the account of Te Whakatōhea chief Mokomoko, wrongfully executed in Ōpōtiki in 1865, and the whenua taken in his name. A long-standing DOP for Waka Huia, the te reo Māori series that has recorded the knowledge of our kaumātua for nearly forty years. And camera, then DOP, across two seasons of The Operatives, filming the people who put themselves between wildlife crime and the wild, broadcast in ninety countries.

It has always been the same work: standing with those who protect what matters. These are the films where it became my own.

Also available as DOP with full kit →

The full body of work →
Waikaremoana
Kahurangi
The Film · Third and Final Chapter

Sams Creek. The living myth continues to unfold.

The fourth documentary in a sustained body of work on water in Mohua. A record of the peaceful occupation of a remote mining exploration site on the edge of Kahurangi National Park. and the ongoing campaign to return Sams Awa to National Park status.

We had a win. The work continues. Protection of our wai must be ensured in perpetuity.

Post-production: colour grade, sound mix, and delivery for international festival release. Shooting for CPH:DOX. This is the current priority, but the work doesn't end here.

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Sams Awa
Te Puoro
Explore The Music →
The Music

Rhythmic rebellion.

Resistance in another register.

The handpan found me during a hard season and became the way I metabolise what the camera takes in. Offered in concert and recording, it carries something of taonga pūoro and karakia for the waters. What the lens witnesses, the steel releases.

Golden Bay · Mohua
Te Haerenga
Stay Close

The work continues.

New films, new recordings, live shows, and the ongoing campaign for the waters. Finishing the Sams Creek film is the current priority. Everything that follows is part of the same weaving.

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Explore the music →
Ko Wai Ahau
Timothy Firkin
Ko Wai

Golden Bay, Aotearoa.

Fifteen years behind the camera. Tūhoe and Pākehā. Based in Mohua, Golden Bay.

Four water documentaries in Mohua. DOP across two seasons of Stolen Lands, years on Waka Huia, eighteen episodes and ninety countries on The Operatives. Currently finishing the third in a series of Mohua water documentaries, cutting a feature on deep sea bottom trawling, and getting Sama, a Shipibo documentary shot in the Peruvian Amazon, across the finish line. Conception to output, I edit everything.

The music came later and stayed. The handpan found me during a hard season and became the way I metabolise what the camera takes in. The frequencies move through you before language gets involved. Solo recordings, a studio EP with saxophone, and live with KŌHATU, a six-piece band born around a campfire that outgrew the lounge and found itself under a pagoda playing to the valley. The kaupapa is kaitiakitanga.

Three instruments, one weaving.