Bob is the Professor of Māori Visual Arts at Massey University’s Whiti o Rehua School of Art at Massey University. He became an Officer of the New Zealand Order of Merit for services to Māori and indigenous art and education in the 2016 Honours list. In 2018 he was awarded the Massey University medal for individual research, and he was the recipient of the Wallace Arts Trust Paramount Award in 2019. In 2020 he received the Te Papa Rongomaraeroa Award for his contribution to Te Ao Māori. In 2021 he became a Fellow of the Royal Society of New Zealand for contribution to research. In the same year he was awarded an ANZAAE Premier Award for ‘Sustained leadership, outstanding service, and contributions to research in art education’.

He contributes to Māori Development through his teaching at the undergraduate and postgraduate levels, his research into traditional Māori carving, and his academic writing straddling art education, contemporary and traditional Māori art, and identity politics.

He is also a practising artist.

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