Borni Te Rongopai Tukiwaho (Tūhoe, Tuwharetoa, Te Arawa)- is the director of the Auckland Fringe Festival: Te Ahurei Mōwaho o Tāmaki Makaurau and Kaiwhakahaere/founder of arts hauora brokership company Taurima Vibes.

Borni has navigated his career between the arts and hauora sectors, consciously creating and weaving brokership pathways between the two. He has his bachelor’s degree in Performing and Screen Arts and studied his post grad in applied theatre and social education at the University of Auckland. To gain stronger health relationships and knowledge he works alongside mental health organisations Changing Minds, Mind and Body and sits on the Te Hiringa Hauora/Health Promotions Agency- National Māori Mental Health Advisory Rōpu. The advisory rōpu have been instrumental in the restructuring of the national mental health initiative Like Minds Like Mine re-launching the initiative as Nōku Te Ao: Like Minds July 2021. He is currently in consultation to help create process on the restructuring of Auckland Councils Arts and Culture Strategy Toi Whitiki and working with Arts Access Aotearoa to create strengthened engagement strategies for their national creative spaces and upcoming wananga.

Borni has previously been a lecturer with MIT, The Actors Programme, South Seas Film and Television College and has been contracted as a consultant for Massy University and Auckland Uni. He is a founding member and Kaiārahi of Te Ora Auaha  a national alliance dedicated to communicating the benefits and contribution the arts have to our collective hauora. Commissioned by Play Market NZ, he co-authored a national wellness resource Working Together: Safety, Respect and Wellbeing for their Guidline series,  and is the only Māori, chapter contributor (authored alongside Dr Molly Mullen), for the most recent academic applied theatre resource “International Routledge Companion to Applied Performance”.

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Taurima Vibes is an important intermediary organisation that creates brokership opportunities for a vast array of communities across Aotearoa. As brokers we are committed to bringing spotlight to margenalised community, undervalued and historically unheard communities and bridging the gaps between the privileged and under resourced, using the creative arts as our main communication mechanism .  We are creators, advisors and consultants leading in advocacy, strategic community engagement and creative sector development for the arts and well-being across the motu.

We are a small company with a wide reach and strong impact. Our work is guided by the foundations of tikanga, matauranga and te ao māori, leading us to work with rōpu that range from grass-roots community to government led institutions. At the core of our work the primary focus is always with the base community in mind. When working on high level initiatives we aim to dismantle problematic infrastructural issues to address accessibility barriers, and help organisations to re-form strategies that are open, accessible and truly work for communities at all levels.