PEOPLE, IMAGES and THINGS
A two day conference 30-31 October 2015
SPEAKERS ABSTRACTS
Michael Aird, Independent Curator and Publisher
Paul Memmott, University of Queensland
Return of the Wild Australia Show
This paper describes Meston’s ‘Wild Australia Show’ (1892-1893) and the process of
presenting the story almost 120 years later as a photographic exhibition at the University of
Queensland’s Anthropology Museum in 2015. As the authors work on a revised version of the
exhibition for a regional centre tour and larger metropolitan venues, various research and
curatorial issues have emerged to shape the design of this exhibition, and which contribute to
new educational methods and ethical standards in engaging the public with historical cultural
heritage. In particular, we present the events of 1892 and 1893 as an educational crystal ball
or lens into the social conditions of Aboriginal people today. We discuss the contemporary
movement to humanise researchers’ subjects and repatriate them back to their home country
and people. These significances represent the culmination of research from anthropology,
social history, linguistics, museology and photography; and they ensure a trajectory for these
photographs and artefacts into the future.
Lindy Allen, Museum Victoria
Mediating Interpretations
Early museum collections from Milingimbi in Arnhem Land
This paper draws upon research being undertaken with Yolngu at Milingimbi in Arnhem Land
in relation to their cultural patrimony dispersed across museums in Australia, Europe and the
USA, and is part of an ARC Linkage project, The Legacy of 50 years of Collecting at Milingimbi
Mission. It reveals the way in which research on early mission collections has great
contemporary relevance to Yolngu at Milingimbi, and provides a critical examination of a
significant body of cultural material collected in the earliest years of the Methodist mission
station of Milingimbi. Interrogation of the structure and content of the earliest collections,
particularly from the first decade or so of the mission, as well as consideration of the
individuals who made these collections provide a crucial window to understanding the way in
which Yolngu positioned themselves as cultural brokers in the new social order that was
created at the mission.
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Jilda Andrews, Australian National University and National Museum of Australia
Off-Country
The cultural life of collected material [a performance]
Within the world’s ethnographic collections lies material which represents the active, lived
and cultural experience of Australia’s Indigenous people. These collections also both record
and demonstrate disruptive and enduring colonial legacies of the past 230 years. In a changing
global contemporary space and increasingly armed with agency and intellectual nous,
Indigenous communities and individuals seek to access collected material, not only to assist
in the objects’ custodianship and care, but to reinstate and recognise cultural relationships
between objects and the continuing cultures which produced them. As cultural stakeholders
in the same collected material, museums and Indigenous source communities now need to
renegotiate their relationships and collaboratively develop approaches that allow enduring
cultural connections to occur, off country, and beyond a museum-based encounter.
Ian Coates, National Museum of Australia
Old Objects Made New
During the course of developing the Indigenous Australia and Encounters exhibitions, curators
have worked with a range of people from Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities
across Australia. A major part of this work has been re-connecting people with the objects,
and their histories, in the British Museum’s collection. These reconnections have been a
catalyst for both the making of new objects, responding to those in the Museum, as well as
for the making of new understandings of the local cross-cultural histories which surround
these objects. This paper will explore how these issues have played out in different
communities.
Rebecca Conway, Macleay Museum
“Everything is telling us who we are”
Yolŋu collections at University of Sydney
The late Dr Gumbula, like Yolŋu elders, worked collaboratively with outsiders to promote an
understanding of their culture. In 2006, I began working with him during his ARC funded
research at the University of Sydney assessing historic photographs from Arnhem Land in the
University Archives and Macleay Museum. These collections include some of the earliest
photographs of Yolŋu communities at Milingimbi and Galiwin’ku in eastern Arnhem Land, and
were predominately taken by missionary T.T. Webb (1926-1939) and anthropologist William
Lloyd Warner (1927-29). Gumbula’s work included the development of the exhibition,
Makarr-Garma: Aboriginal collections from a Yolŋu perspective, and here I describe the
development, curatorial rationale and processes by which took shape. Of particular focus will
be the way in which Gumbula’s interpretation of Yolŋu culture and philosophy drove object
selection and design imperatives. The exhibition grew beyond expectation to encompass not
only historical photographs but artworks, cultural objects, a soundtrack and natural history
specimens structured as a performance of a Yolŋu day.
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Fran Edmonds, University of Melbourne
Into the Future
Aboriginal young people, Indigenous collections and the digital realm
Young Aboriginal people from the Korin Gamadji Institute at Richmond Football Club in
Victoria have been involved in digital storytelling workshops as part of an ARC Linkage Project.
Workshops were run, aimed at providing youth with innovative approaches for exploring their
identity and for creating images and narratives to support this in the digital realm. Participants
were introduced to exhibitions in the First People’s gallery at Melbourne Museum and
Australian Indigenous heritage material in Museum Victoria’s collections. However while they
made digital photographs and videos of the collections, few of these have made their way into
participants’ final digital stories. By drawing on examples from the workshops and our ongoing
research into digital collections - I raise two key questions in this paper: how does access to
collections and associated collection policies impact the level of engagement for Aboriginal
young people with the material culture of their Ancestors; and given the extensive production
and distribution of digital images of Indigenous culture, including images made by the young
people for their stories, what are some of the implications for the management and access of
this material as digital collections in the future?
Jason Gibson, Museum Victoria
Putting Objects in Their Place
Re-reading central Australian object documentation
In this paper I trace the history of trade in central Australian ethnographic objects back to the
late 19th century, when policemen, missionaries and museums had created a market for
Aboriginal artefacts. To illustrate the nature of this trade and its treatment by the various
institutions I firstly examine the collecting of Mounted Constable Ernest Cowle at the end of
the 19th century and the Finke River Mission later in the 1930s. My recent research on these
collections, conducted in collaboration with the Arrernte staff at the Strehlow Research
Centre in Alice Springs, has revealed a fragmentary and yet revelatory suite of documentation
that has helped us re-imagine an objects place within the storied landscape of the Central
Australia and rediscover a number of objects thought to have been either lost or destroyed.
Evidence of active Arrernte participation in this trade also urges us to rethink the relationships
between traditional owners, collectors, collecting institutions.
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Julie Gough, Artist and Curator
The Lost World Project
The motivation and means for an Aboriginal response
to a UK museum collection (and where to from there)
In October 2013 the artist, Julie Gough, installed new work in the Museum of Archaeology and
Anthropology at the University of Cambridge, UK. The Lost World (part 2) exhibition was the
culmination of more than two years of developing and undertaking an intuitive art response
to the Tasmanian Aboriginal stone artefacts held in that institution. The longevity,
collaborative nature, and multiple outputs of The Lost World (part 2) continues to direct the
process of projects since, including seeking expansive relationships with institutions beyond
their normative remit. Managed by expatriate Australian curator and artist Khadija von
Zinnenburg Carroll, The Lost World (part 2) achieved greater outreach than possible from a
direct collaboration between the artist and a far distant museum. This paper raises questions
about an Aboriginal artist’s position in an ethnographic space, what might be reviewed or
destabilized as a result of working with the place and collections, and whether art galleries
and museums are in fact much different contexts for Indigenous people.
Diane Hafner, University of Queensland
Heritage and Kinship
Mutualities and overlapping interests in research pursuits
The Lamalama people of Cape York Peninsula have accessed heritage materials in museums
for over two decades, working in particular on the Donald Thomson Collection at Museum
Victoria. Many of their Elders made visits to MV with anthropologist Bruce Rigsby, and now a
younger Lamalama generation is continuing this work. It is apparent that they see this work
as a continuing project that honours the joint endeavours of both their elders and such
anthropologists, expressed in the words of one Lamalama woman as ‘continuing your work’.
This paper explores the mutual appropriations engaged in such comments, including
questions of the degree to which close fictive relationships contribute to successful
engagements between museums and descendant source communities, and how this might be
evaluated.
Louise Hamby, Australian National University
Fabric Fragments to Fashion
The meanings and interpretations of objects in museum collections are not fixed, and are
interpreted differently over time by members of different cultures. The influences that
determine interpretations of objects can be linked not only to the materials from which they
are made but the relationship between the objects and the people who make and use them.
In the past the materials used in production of an object often determined its inclusion in
Aboriginal collections. This was more so in the stage of collection known as collecting under
the influence of ‘before it is too late’ (c.1920-c.1940). Amongst the introduced and
manufactured materials found in objects that deterred their collection were fragments of
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cloth. This paper draws upon research for the ARC Linkage project, The Legacy of 50 years of
Collecting at Milingimbi Mission. Many of the primary collectors from Milingimbi such as
Donald Thomson, Lloyd Warner, TT Webb and Harold Shepherdson obtained such objects.
The research aims to reveal that Aboriginal people valued the fabric and used it in creative
ways. Their use of fabric has changed over time from fragments to printed fabrics. The paper
also shows the shifting impulses and motivations of the collectors themselves.
Rosita Henry, James Cook University
Creative Connections
An artefact collection from the wet tropics of north Queensland
By tracing the history of a particular collection of Aboriginal artefacts made between 1882 and
1897 by John Archibald Boyd at Ripple Creek sugarcane plantation near Ingham, North
Queensland, I reflect on the nature of the relationship between persons and things. I explore
the significance of the artefacts as things that connect people into different kinds of
relationship across time and place. During the late 1800s and into the early twentieth century
the kinds of things that Boyd collected accrued value as ‘artefacts’ that could be bought, sold,
traded, donated and gifted. More recently Rainforest Aboriginal artists have imbued such
things with new life and value through the creation of fine art works that are inspired by them.
Thus, collections such as Boyd's figure significantly in the creative endeavour that enables
Indigenous people to connect into a wider social universe, through the global art market.
Melinda Hinkson, Australian National University
Conundrums of the Archive
The case of the Warlpiri drawings
In the early 1950s Warlpiri men and women of central Australia made crayon drawings on
paper for anthropologist Mervyn Meggitt. On the eve of his departure to the USA in 1965,
Meggitt deposited the drawings and his associated documentation with the Australian
Institute of Aboriginal Studies. Six decades later I have introduced the drawings to
descendants of the men and women who made them. This paper tracks the movement across
time and space of these pictures and considers the ways in which ‘a collection’ splinters into
an amorphous, ambiguous and potent set of statements, provocations and actions when met
by persons with deep investments in the materials in question. Recent Warlpiri responses to
the drawings give a compelling sense of how the ‘return’ of a cultural archive is entangled
with complex legacies of colonialism, triggering not only reflections on the past, but
articulations of hope and fear for the future.
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Sabine Hoeng, Museum and Art Gallery of the Northern Territory
“One artist, many names”
Reassembling the oeuvres of Indigenous artists from museum collections
Throughout the short collection history of Australian Indigenous Art, it has always been a
challenge for western collectors to reliably transcribe the Indigenous personal names of
artists. Early missionaries, government officials, anthropologists and amateur collectors either
transcribed the (for them) tongue-twisting sounds by ear, or adopted ephemeral spelling
conventions established by one generation of linguists, only to be thrown out and replaced by
the next. To complicate matters further, painters may have used more than one personal
name, and may also have been identified by their ‘skin name’, or an anglicized name they
acquired in the context of cross-cultural contact. As a result, some artists have succumbed to
the archival equivalent of multiple personality disorder, accumulating a number of name
variants over time, which live on in collection management systems in the form of multiple
creator identities, their works leading to a fragmented existence within and across our
museums’ collections. Drawing on my research in northwestern Arnhem Land, I discuss
examples of how the use of modern technology and collaborative research with the producing
culture can shed light on creators’ identities and allow the reassembling of their oeuvres. I
argue that it is important for contemporary collection management systems to retain these
original name variants as they can act as indicators for the provenance and period of
manufacture of a work.
Jonathon Jones, Artist and Curator
Carol Cooper, National Museum of Australia
The Maker’s Hand
Designs in wood
Wiradjuri/Kamilaroi independent artist and curator Jonathan Jones and NMA curator and
historian Carol Cooper are combining their research to work through objects and images
relating to south-eastern Australian Aboriginal men’s weapons. Their shared study is focused
on decorated shields, clubs and spear throwers held in the colonial frameworks of museums
and galleries, together with archival images and texts, to further identify and link these objects
to specific areas, language groups, and, in some instances, to individual artists and makers.
This research, guided by Indigenous research methodologies, draws together hundreds of
currently undocumented museum and gallery objects now largely divorced from their source
cultures, and establishes relationships between these objects that reawaken knowledge and
connections for the benefit of communities. Delivering ‘case studies’ that demonstrate the
potential within the nation’s vast cultural collections, Jones and Cooper’s research aims to
reconnect objects to place, and return meaning to the many undocumented and unattributed
wooden weapons from south-eastern Australia in museum and gallery storerooms
throughout Australia and the world.
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Christiane Keller, National Museum of Australia and ANU
Body and Flesh
Interrogating sculpture from Milingimbi
The ARC Linkage project, The legacy of 50 years collecting at Milingimbi Mission, focusing on
the period 1923 to 1973, has exposed large collections of Milingimbi artworks, photographs
and documents in Australian, European and American collections. The information collated
from these collections provides the basis for an interrogation of sculptural production. Using
a cross-disciplinary approach, I will initially trace the development from ceremonial object to
artistic sculpture and the various influences of missionaries, collectors and a developing art
market. Together with members of the Milingimbi community I will then also attempt an
interpretation and analysis of sculptural forms and their relationship to bark paintings.
Leah Lui-Chivizhe, Macleay Museum
Op-le
Visual traditions, marine environments and Torres Strait Islander knowledge
Famously Torres Strait Islanders are internationally known for their fine work in turtle-shell
masks which held knowledge thought both spiritually powerful and saturated with
personhood (individuality). This paper uses Islander perceptions to unpack Eurocentric
narratives and notions about the material of turtle-shell which had and has religious, secret,
sacred, gendered and everyday value for Islanders across the region and mainland Australia.
Jude Philp, Macleay Museum
Krar
Turtle-shell masks from Mabuyag
The production of spectacular sculptural works made by Torres Strait Islanders from turtleshell was arrested by large-scale colonial and commercial influence and because of the
interest of collectors in acquiring these turtle-shell objects. In histories of the Torres Strait it
is commonly put that the western islands took the brunt of colonial aggression, whether
directly as people were moved off islands for colonial governance, or indirectly through largescale commercial enterprise in the form of beche-de-mer and pearlshell harvesting. This paper
takes these two commonly held perceptions as a starting point to an archival investigation
into masks from the western island of Mabuyag. I argue that the weight of evidence of these
objects refutes some long-held assumptions about Islander kastom in the 19th century.
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Antoinette Smith, University of Tasmania
Connecting Baskets
Research and engagement with Aboriginal communities
The purpose of this paper is to unravel the ways in which meaning is brought to an object that
sits outside of its original environment within collections. These items are often dislocated
from any record of its origins or have only fragmentary associated information. This research
involves delving into records, images and the object and is a complex and often difficult
process that involves working across disciplines to bring all the clues together to enrich what
is known about the object. My case study looks at baskets from Victoria and shows how this
research can contextualise the object within a particular space but does not completely
interpret or connect it to the people, land and cultural context from which it emerged.
Completing these connections is dependent upon Aboriginal engagement with collections and
partnerships with the relevant Aboriginal community and in particular current practitioners
with cultural knowledge and skills that allow the object to be embedded and understood
within an enriched historical and cultural context.
Mariko Smith, University of Sydney
Connections Through Collections
Indigenous cultural resurgence and Aboriginal tied-bark canoes
For my PhD research on Aboriginal tied-bark canoe making initiatives in south-eastern
Australian Aboriginal communities today, I reviewed museum photographic collections and
exhibitions. I found that a number of communities interested in cultural resurgence consult
these materials to inform their canoe making practices and cultural identities. An exciting
development is Aboriginal peoples actively engaging with these materials in ways which
transform the relevance, significance and value of such museum objects from colonial
mementos of an Indigenous past to something that is dynamic, empowering and contributing
to continuing culture. I characterise these collections, exhibitions, and the broader digital
platform as today’s “message sticks" for communities to learn from and
communicate their cultures with others.
Wendy Somerville, University of Canberra
Who Defines Aboriginal Identity?
Is the new answer the same as the old?
This paper explores aspects of the construction of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander identity
in both colonial and contemporary settings through analysis of “documents” which have been
used to prove identity to government. To gain access to government funded services
contemporary Aboriginal and Torres Island Islanders are required to provide a Confirmation
of Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander Descent Certificate which verifies claims of Indigeneity.
In the colonial era the practice of bestowing gorgets on Aboriginal people to curry favour and
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gain access to knowledge of their lands began in the early 1800s and persisted into the 20th
century. Also known as “Breast Plates” or “King Plates”, many of these objects of the “contact
zone” carry Anglicised names and are held in public and private collections across Australia.
The bestowal of these symbolic objects lies is earlier versions of non-Aboriginal processes of
defining Aboriginal people and creating their identity as “other”.
Peter White, National Film and Sound Archive
The Mob Rules
A paradigm shift for the cultural sector?
Cultural institutions have a chequered past in their interactions with Australia’s First Peoples.
From the collecting of cultural materials, to their subsequent management and interpretation,
approaches have almost always been undertaken through western constructs. Does this need
to change? To answer this we first have to ask what the inherent value of these collections
are, both to their communities of origin and to society more broadly and are the current
systems adequate? While these questions have been increasingly asked over the last 35 years,
it can be argued that we have seen limited movement on the issue. This paper will present an
alternative viewpoint that challenges the current status quo and charts a new framework for
the sector to adopt. A framework that address the need for an ultimate shift in the power
dynamics of the sector to one of Ochlocracy. Mob-rule, but more importantly Our Mob that
of Australia’s First Peoples.
Michael Wood, James Cook University
Researching and Renewing Links
Dudley Bulmer’s artefacts and his legacy
Members of the Bulmer family and I have recently researched some artefacts made by Dudley
Bulmer in 1930s Yarrabah, North Queensland. Prior to this research Dudley’s descendants
were unaware of the existence of these artefacts now held in the South Australian
Museum. While I was interested in the artefacts as like autobiographical texts and precursors
of the life story genre of writing, members of the Bulmer family have been primarily interested
in researching aspects of Dudley Bulmer’s legacy that could be linked to land claims. This paper
outlines how our over-lapping interests in producing new knowledge about Dudley Bulmer
involved quite distinct kinds of representational politics.
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