Helena Halliday

Our Aotearoa was always going to be an ambitious project, and I’m glad we finished the three episodes we set out to do. I joined this project because everyone involved was so passionate and I was curious as how an animated documentary would work. I worked in both the development phase as a producer and during production as an animator, which allowed me to further both my project management and artistic skills.

Our Aotearoa is an animated documentary series that speaks to immigrants' personal experiences of living in Aotearoa. These episodes explore themes of racism, discrimination, loss, loneliness, and maintaining cultural ties while living in another country. We feel there is little multicultural representation in mainstream media in Aotearoa. This project's purpose is to help open a dialogue for a more diverse representation of Aotearoa – the one we know, Our Aotearoa.