Vaimoana Niumeitolu

Vaimoana (Moana) Niumeitolu is an Artist (Art Maker, Painter, Community Muralist, Poet, Writer, Actress and Performer) and Educator. She was born in Nuku’alofa, Tonga; raised in Hawai’i and Utah and is based in NYC. She is the founder of Mahina Movement, an all woman music and poetry trio who have performed on over 500 stages. Moana is the author of a poetry, performance text, and visual art chapbook, tonga provo harlem. She has directed and written over 20 educational theater productions with youth including, a production being performed at Lincoln Center; NYC. She has completed 24 community murals in Australia, Kenya, Jordan, New Zealand, Palestine, South Africa and in the United States: California, New York (Brooklyn and the Bronx) and Utah. She has been seen acting at the Metropolitan Opera and sharing her one woman show, Tongue-in Paint, which had it’s world premiere at Performance Space 122; NYC. Her other production, A Prayer for Tonga, premiered at Harvard University. She graduated from New York University in painting and performance, earned the Ellen Stoekel Fellowship/full scholarship in painting & drawing from Yale University and attended Columbia University’s Graduate Program in Acting.