Arnold Manaaki Wilson was born in 1928, in Ruatoki, a community which nestles beneath the misty Taiarahia hills, following the curves of the Ohinemataroa river valley – known to others as of his tuhoe people. They know him there as Te Wakaunua, after a provocative late 19th century political visionary. From Such radical Tuhoe ideas fused with the sculptural genius of his father, a renowned carver of the art-making Ngati Tarawhai of Te Arawa, Arnold Wilson emerged.