Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art: An Anthropology of Identity Production in Far North Queensland 1350097233, 9781350097230

Citation preview

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art

Also available from Bloomsbury The Anthropologist as Curator, edited by Roger Sansi Art, Anthropology, and Contested Heritage, edited by Arnd Schneider Making Aboriginal Men and Music in Central Australia, Ase Ottosson Practicing Art and Anthropology, Anna Laine

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art An Anthropology of Identity Production in Far North Queensland Gretchen M. Stolte

BLOOMSBURY ACADEMIC Bloomsbury Publishing Plc 50 Bedford Square, London, WC1B 3DP, UK 1385 Broadway, New York, NY 10018, USA BLOOMSBURY, BLOOMSBURY ACADEMIC and the Diana logo are trademarks of Bloomsbury Publishing Plc First published in Great Britain 2020 Copyright © Gretchen M. Stolte, 2020 Gretchen M. Stolte has asserted her right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988, to be identified as Author of this work. For legal purposes the Acknowledgements on p. xv–xvi constitute an extension of this copyright page. Cover image: Visual Mosaic, 2010, digital image, Cultural Group; Yidinji (© Ian Jensen) Back cover image: Weres Segur, 2010, acrylic on canvas, Cultural Group; Erub Islander (© Robert Thomas Pau) All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any information storage or retrieval system, without prior permission in writing from the publishers. Bloomsbury Publishing Plc does not have any control over, or responsibility for, any third-party websites referred to or in this book. All internet addresses given in this book were correct at the time of going to press. The author and publisher regret any inconvenience caused if addresses have changed or sites have ceased to exist, but can accept no responsibility for any such changes. A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library. A catalog record for this book is available from the Library of Congress. ISBN: HB: 978-1-3500-9723-0 ePDF: 978-1-3500-9724-7 ePub: 978-1-3500-9725-4 Typeset by Newgen KnowledgeWorks Pvt. Ltd., Chennai, India To find out more about our authors and books visit www.bloomsbury.com and sign up for our newsletters.

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples from Queensland are advised that this book contains names of deceased people that they may wish to avoid seeing. All readers are advised that images and artworks are used with the artists’ permission and that artists retain the cultural and artistic copyright to those images.

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Contents List of Figures  List of Tables  Preface  Acknowledgements  1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9

Art and identity  Curios and artefacts  The history of the studio  The studio today  Disciplining the artist  Value creation and the market  Design elements  Cultural content  True North 

Bibliography  Index 

viii x xi xv 1 19 57 81 103 125 145 167 187 215 227

Figures 1 Photo included in the Queensland government’s Public Relations Bureau’s News Bulletin from 28 November 1958. Source: Queensland State Archives Item ID502314, Correspondence, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander.  2 Early design schematic for the Queensland Native Creations sticker of authenticity which was to be placed on each item for sale, 1959. Source: Queensland State Archives Item ID502314, Correspondence, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander.  3 QAC artworks sent to Aboriginal Arts Management Association for evaluation in the manner of the Central Desert dot painting style, 1991. Source: Queensland State Archives Item ID646421, Correspondence, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander.  4 Jack O’Chin, shadowbox from Cherbourg (1962). From the collection of Peg Jackson. Courtesy Michael Aird. Photo credit: The author.  5 Inside the studio, 2010. Photo credit: The author.  6 Ian Jensen, Identity (2010), digital work. Photo credit: The artist.  7 Allan Martin, Cultural Identity: Totems (2010), vinyl-cut print on paper. Photo credit: The author.  8 Pellista Lammon, Coral Garden (2010), acrylic on canvas. Photo credit: The author.  9 Lynelle Flinders, Seed Time (2010), acrylic on canvas. Photo credit: The author.  10 Peter Morrison, monochromatic jug exercise using a biased colour palette, detail (2010). Photo credit: The author.  11 Example of the Bauhaus experiment in process (2010). Photo credit: The author.  12 Various boomerangs purchased during the 2010 fieldwork period. Photo credit: The author.  13 Lynelle Flinders, untitled landscapes (2010), gouache on paper. Photo credit: The author. 

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199 200 200 201 201 202 202 203 203 204

Figures

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14 Peter Morrison, On the Farm (right) (2010), water colour on paper. Photo credit: The author.  204 15 Peter Morrison, Feasting (2010), linoprint. 2010. Photo credit: The author.  205 16 Liz Saveka, Everyday People (2010), mixed media on paper. Photo credit: The author.  205 17 Liz Saveka, untitled (2010), screenprint and batik. Photo credit: The author.  206 18 Charlie Sailor, Rebes (2010). Pen and ink. Photo credit: The author.  206 19 Design elements commonly found within the studio. Graphic: The author.  207 20 Charlie Sailor, Gabba Gabba (2010), acrylic on canvas. Photo credit: The author.  208 21 Allan Martin, Lizard (2010), vinyl-cut print on paper. Photo credit: The author.  208 22 Darren Blackman, Moon Cycle (2010), batik. Photo credit: The author.  209 23 Peter Morrison, Diving Down (2010), vinyl-cut print on paper. Photo credit: The author.  209 24 Charlie Sailor, Torres Strait Pigeon (Dewmer) (2010), acrylic on canvas. Photo credit: The author.  210 25 Ian Jensen, ‘Bigunu’ (Shield) > Clan Design (2010), acrylic on canvas. Photo credit: The artist.  210 26 Ian Jensen, Creation Series #1 (2010), digital work. Photo credit: The artist.  211 27 Tommy Pau, Kab Kar (2010), digital work. Photo credit: The artist.  211 28 Tommy Pau, Zogo Le Ra Pone (2010), digital work. Photo credit: The artist.  212 29 Tommy Pau, Mask Dancers (2010), vinyl-cut print on paper. Photo credit: The author.  212 30 Leon Namai, Kaurareg Nation (2010), vinyl-cut print on paper. Photo credit: The author.  213 31 Leon Namai, Seven Brothers (2010), vinyl-cut print on paper. Photo credit: The author.  213 32 Eddie Sam, Weris (2010), acrylic on canvas. Photo credit: The author.  214

Tables 4 .1 7.1 7.2 7.3

Active participants in the research  List of design elements used in the studio  Frequency of design elements in the studio  Frequency of design elements in the studio according to how artists identify  7.4 Distribution of fauna types within the studio  7 .5 Distribution of bird species within the studio 

85 151 152 153 160 162

Preface In 2010, I entered ‘the field’ that liminal space anthropologists create in order to answer the questions that plague them. I came to study First Nations identity in Australia and I ended up studying First Nations identity in myself. My entry into the field, as an anthropologist and art historian, was immediately challenged by the people I wanted to work with – not because of who I was as I thought I was (as a ‘whitefella’) but because of who I was as students perceived me to be (as a ‘blackfella’). This acceptance as a First Nations person was to impact everything. I wanted to conduct research at the TAFE (a technical school) campus inside an art studio exclusively for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander artists in Cairns, Queensland. Research into First Nations peoples needs to start with consultation of those most impacted by the research. As such, I sought to talk with people who could provide some direction for my research project. I was called into the offices of the lead instructor for the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander arts course. We had emailed and spoken on the phone, but this was the first time I was to actually meet Elaine Lampton – the woman who would facilitate and guide my research in ways I would never have thought possible. Elaine greeted me warmly. It took only a few moments for her to grasp what I wanted to do and less time still for her to redirect me. ‘Identity’, she said. ‘It’s always about identity. Who are we? What are we about?’ She brought out a piece of paper and began to draw as she spoke. An artist to the core, Elaine can never talk without drawing at the same time. Even in restaurants when we met for dinner, she would pull out a napkin and start scribbling on it to make her point. ‘See this line?’ She dragged her pencil roughly and quickly across the paper. ‘This is an Aboriginal line, marked by an Aboriginal woman. Who I am makes this line what it is.’ Her confidence falters, however, when she shows me examples of her finished artwork. One is a painting of a car screaming down a road in a highly abstracted background. The entire piece is without a strong sense of place – the car could be anywhere; the space around it any space. The image transcends time and place and emotes a feeling of reckless motion and movement. Elaine tells me about the experience she had when visiting the central desert of the Northern Territory

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where a car had almost run her down. She looks at the painting though and sighs. ‘It’s not really that Aboriginal of an art piece, is it?’ The way Elaine vacillated between believing in the Aboriginality of a single line while dismissing her painting as not ‘Aboriginal’ enough would be my first glimpse into this tension of being a First Nations artist in contemporary times. On one hand, she knew who she was and where she came from and was proud of her Aboriginality. However, she understood her art in completely different terms. I was pondering this dichotomy when she stood up with a sudden energy and asked me, ‘Do you want to meet the artists?’ I hesitated as this was the last thing I was prepared for, but I followed her into the studio and stood awkwardly in front of twenty unsmiling students. Elaine introduced me as a university student who was doing research about First Nations art and then, in that unexpected way which I was never to get used to, she turned to me and asked me to speak. ‘Tell them about your project’, she told me. Doctoral students are always asked to explain their research  – more often than not because they cannot. The answer fluctuates throughout the research and writing process, but to have to speak about my project in front of a sea of hostile faces was confronting. I had come to Cairns to find a research project which mattered to Aboriginal and Islander artists and I was certainly not prepared – not even remotely prepared – to articulate the project in any clear fashion. I blurted out the first thing I thought of and told them the story about my grandmother. My grandmother, Capella Francis Smith, was born on a Native American Nez Perce (Nimi’ipuu) Reservation in eastern Washington in the United States. Her mother was Josephine Foley, a Nez Perce woman, and her father was Clinton LeBreiox, a French-Canadian man (there are romantic family rumours that he was an astronomer). I told them about how my grandmother had been removed from the Reservation when she was 2 years old and adopted by a white family. I  told the class that in my country, I  was not considered Native American because of this complex history and the way First Nations tribes defined their enrolment criteria. I  said that in Australia, identifying as First Nations was different. Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders could identify and connect with their heritage in ways which were unique and special. I  said that I  wanted to understand that process and that since I was an artist I wanted to understand that process through art. I  told the story as a way of communicating what I understood to be the unusual position of First Nations Australians and my own experiences seemed the most straightforward way to demonstrate my intentions without a lot of academic jargon.

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Elaine thanked me and told the students that if anyone wanted to talk with me about what I had said, I would be available in the theory room – a small, private room adjacent to the studio. She encouraged the students to talk with me and I went to wait. I did not honestly think anyone would come and talk with me. I was not even ready to talk with people and I was about to leave the studio and head back to my hotel when I noticed a woman coming to speak with me. This was my first meeting with Rita. Rita sat next to me and did not even allow me to speak before she started talking. ‘You know what you were saying in there? You are brainwashed. Your government has brainwashed you into believing you’re not Native. You know what? You’re Native. You just don’t know it yet, but you’re Native, alright.’ I sat there gaping at her, not really able to take in all she was saying. ‘Did you notice those boys who were ignoring you? Their heads turned to you when you talked about your grandmother. They recognised you as Native. You can’t ignore it anymore.’ We talked for maybe ten or fifteen more minutes before Rita went back into the studio. I promptly left the TAFE – without saying good bye or even thanking Elaine for her help. I  was quite honestly taken aback by the assertions that I might call myself a Native American; that I could actually claim my ancestry was something I had never considered an option. It honestly floored me to the point where I had to escape the studio. This declaration of my own Indigeneity by Rita echoed throughout my time in the field as word quickly spread about my heritage. I  was introduced as ‘the Native American’ in social situations. I  was asked questions about my ‘culture’ such as ‘how do you say hello in your language?’ I was even assumed to have cultural knowledge about traditional stories, artwork and food. It was an incredible insight into the type of assumptions Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples face. In some ways, this was the ultimate participant observation exercise. This assertion of my identity – enforced through positive environments and total acceptance  – affected me personally in many ways. People considered me First Nations and opportunities opened as people treated me differently because of this identity. I realized it was a very real ‘power’ to hold, and I felt an enormous responsibility. If I was going to be treated as a First Nations person, I needed to be a First Nations person, right? I ended up doing what I saw other Aboriginal and Islander people do when they found themselves in a similar position of unknowing:  I bought and read books about Nez Perce history, traditional art styles and current events; I connected with an online group of Nez

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Perce language speakers who accepted my declarations of kinship and I began the process of learning Nimiputímt, the Nez Perce language; I  began to learn more about my grandmother’s people and I can now extend my lineage back five generations. The biggest visual representation of this exploration of identity was learning traditional beadwork techniques and processes. I have always declared my Nez Perce heritage as a child to anyone who would listen and I have been a beadworker since I was a teen, but these experiences in Cairns were something new. The process of connecting and declaring was at times a very emotional journey but ultimately a very rewarding one as well. All of this illustrates a very important point in the politics of First Nations Australian art production. Elaine, who was dark-skinned and has never doubted or have had cause to doubt her Aboriginality, faltered when presenting an art piece which she felt was ‘not very Aboriginal’. Less than an hour later, I  was declared, with my light skin and complete lack of cultural knowledge, as First Nations and within six months was producing beaded works which were taken as ‘authentic’ pieces. Why would Elaine’s painting be considered less Aboriginal? Why was my beadwork taken as ‘authentic’? Put simply, there are factors which determine the acceptance of artworks based on popular expectations of what a First Nations work should look like and what it cannot look like. This book reflects on these issues of traditionalism, authenticity and Indigeneity and explores how expectations of Aboriginal and Islander works influence, affect and shape the production of those artworks. I focus on not only the voices of First Nations artists in Cairns but also the deep history these voices grew up in. Part ethnography, part history, this book hopes to bridge the gap between a confidently drawn line and a melancholy dismissal.

Acknowledgements I would like to acknowledge the Yidinji people, the Traditional Owners of land on whom this research was conducted. I pay my respects to your Ancestors, the Yidinji people of today and your emerging leaders and elders of tomorrow. The cover of this book, Visual Mosaic, by Yidinji artist Ian Jensen represents ‘jili’ or the eye and reflects never losing sight of one’s traditional and cultural values of the past while also focusing on one’s dreams and aspirations for the future. Visual Mosaic was chosen to acknowledge my time on Yidinji country, your welcoming of me as a visitor and your support of this research. In particular, I  acknowledge the Yidinji Elder Seith Fourmile and your contributions to your people and the wider Cairns community. In my language, qe’ciyéw’yew (thank you). For the research on Queensland Aboriginal Creations (QAC), there were many people who helped me and showed a keen interest in exploring this history. I  want to thank Richard Bell, Bruce McLean, Dr Paul Memmott, Theresa Chelepy-Roberts, the staff at the Queensland State Museum, the staff at the Department of Community Services in conjunction with the Queensland State Archives, especially Kathy Frankland, and the Queensland State Library. John Conroy and Michael Aird were particularly wonderful in helping me see beyond the published accounts and archival records in order to understand the lived experience of QAC. Marshall Bell was generous with his own research and support of this project and his writings on Aboriginal art are indispensable. He passed before its completion, and he will be sorely missed. These people gave generously of their time and knowledge, and I am extremely grateful. I could not have stayed in Brisbane for as long as I did if not for the support of Professor Emeritus Bruce Rigsby, his wonderful wife Barbara Rigsby and their granny flat. Thank you both for your welcoming of me into your home. Qe’ciyéw’yew! There are a number of people who helped develop the Cairns material. Rita Pryce continues to be the most amazing friend, encouraging me to explore my Nez Perce heritage. She started me on a lifelong journey of discovery for which I am eternally grateful. Established artists in the Cairns region were also generous with their time, and thanks go to Zane Saunders, Arone Meeks and Alick Tipoti. Billy Missi sat down with me to discuss some of the finer points of

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his approaches to Torres Strait Islander art and the world is a lesser place without him. Finally, I want to thank Elaine Lampton. Without her help and guidance in the very beginning of this project, I would most certainly have not been able to do what I did. The student artists who worked on this project with me were simply incredible. Their interest, commitment and the sharing of the details of their lives continue to inspire me. Very special mention and thanks go to three artists who have guided me through this research by their invaluable participation and friendship. Tommy Pau was a huge supporter and advocate of the research from the very beginning and taught me much about Torres Strait Islander art. Tommy was the first student to make me feel welcome in the studio and he broke much of the research ‘ice’ I had to initially overcome. He included me in his life and his family and special thanks goes to his wife Mamasung for her friendship and support as well. Ian Jensen gave me a huge insight into local politics and the lived realities of the Traditional Owners of Cairns. His support and generosity in sharing his detailed research and personal documentation regarding Yidinji culture was insightful and much appreciated. I want to thank Lynelle Flinders for her friendship and support and ability to bring everything back down to the most crucial and basic aspects of importance. Nothing could have been accomplished if not for the support and encouragement of my partner, Stephen Oram. He drove through crocodileinfested rivers when I did not want to; talked with Traditional Owners and artists when it was not appropriate for me to do so; and followed me from Brisbane to the Torres Strait Islands and all over Queensland. ‘iin’ee héetewise! All errors remain my own, but all insights remain with the voices of the First Nations peoples who spoke them.

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Art and identity

‘That’s deadly!’ It was a phrase I heard often inside the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander arts studio at the Tropical North Queensland TAFE in Cairns. It meant wellexecuted or well done and was the highest compliment a person could give an artwork. For Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders in Cairns, deadly could also mean so many other things. Anything could be deadly, such as a concept, a project, a success or a moment. Things could be deadly, like movies, clothing or flash cars. Someone asking for a favour would reply with ‘too deadly, mate’ when it was granted. Ideas could be deadly. When I told artists about my research topic, some responded, ‘ah, deadly’. In this instance, the phrase reflected approval and in cases of artworks or dance performances, it was also a mark of admiration. The opposite of deadly in the studio was ‘gammon’. When an artist called a painting gammon, they meant it was of poor quality. People can be gammon if they lie or act falsely. (For example, politicians were frequently referred to as gammon.) When I was subjected to friendly teasing, I was reassured of my good standing with the throwaway remark, ‘just gammon’. In this sense, it was similar to saying ‘just joking’. Gammon had a fluid use within the studio, but it stands in solid opposition to those things and actions that are considered deadly. The production of deadly (and gammon) works inside the TAFE Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander arts studio is at the heart of the production of Australian First Nations identity. What makes one painting deadly and another one gammon? What does it mean to be an Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander art student at a Western institution such as a TAFE? The history of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander art production in Queensland, along with the purposeful development of an art market and the effects of government policies in conceptualizing that market, is scattered across countless sources or buried deep in State archives. For the first time, these materials are consolidated in a single volume in order to tell the story of First Nations art production in

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Queensland. This story takes place inside a school where such productions are codified and structured by State goals and requirements even while, at the same time, those spaces are considered ‘Indigenous’. At the heart of art production is how Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander student artists internalize local, national and historical constructions of First Nations art, Indigeneity and culture. The chapters that follow engage with these issues in order to understand the processes artists go through when entering into the arts market in Queensland. Questions about the relationship between art and First Nations identity production are answered. The anthropologist Howard Morphy proposes that the ‘how’ question is ‘one of the most important questions in the anthropology of art’ (2009:  7). How do Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander artists in Queensland come to use the images they do? In what ways do these images reflect back on their concepts of self? What are the restrictions in such representations and how are such restrictions conceptualized? What are the outside determinants impacting and/or limiting the creative process? What is culture in the sense that Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander artists use it? ‘Culture’ was one of the most used words inside the studio. Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander student artists use the word ‘culture’ as a form of personal identity. Culture as used in the studio includes language, artefacts, design elements and stories to which they could lay hereditary ownership. Through the emphasis of material objects and language as markers of identity and belonging, one could ‘lose’ culture in the same way as one might lose car keys or a pair of gloves. This sense that culture could be lost is an internalization of some of the national dialogue about First Nations peoples in Australia. In public perceptions and newspaper articles, First Nations culture has been one of two things: culture as part of the ‘Aboriginal’ problem (see Sutton 2009) and as those things which are visible and marketable such as artworks and performances (e.g. ‘high culture’). This is a perception that will be dealt with in more detail in the following chapters. As famously prescribed by the anthropologist Bronisław Malinowski, anthropologists collect three forms of social data in the field; these forms surround concepts of ‘what people say about what they do, what they actually do, and what they think’ (Kuper 1973: 30). The differences between these three concepts are what make up the hallmark of anthropologists’ ethnographies, and how these concepts are expressed constitute a form of culture. From an evolutionist and biological perspective of culture (Spencer [1896] 1973), to the distinction between culture and society (Evans-Pritchard 1951:  40), to culture as a mental construct (Erickson and Murphy 2003:  76), to culture



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as ‘webs of significance’ (Geertz 1973:  5), culture is a vastly complicated and malleable concept for anthropologists. The reality is that the word ‘culture’ is used uncritically by the general populace and with fierce attention to detail by anthropologists. The main critique of the culture concept as surmised by the anthropologist Nic Peterson is that there is an implication that ‘people with a common culture have a uniformity of beliefs, values and practices that is not found anywhere in the real world, and that such a group of people can be neatly circumscribed geographically, which is rarely the case’ (Peterson 2010:  252). In particular is Peterson’s observation on how culture is used within Indigenous Australia: More generally speaking, public discussion and in particular Aboriginal discussion around culture tends to be a discourse of enchantment that often elevates culture to an almost sacred status. Culture is further removed from critical appraisal because it is made so central to personal identity that any criticism of it can seem like an attack on an individual’s personal identity. (Peterson 2010: 253)

Inside the arts studio, culture is used as one and the same as identity. How and why this is the case can be understood through the historical misuse of and slippery slope that is the culture concept. Culture not only has been argued as the keystone of the development of anthropology’s identity as a discipline (Bennett 2015: 552; Marcus and Fischer 1986) but has also been shown to help create and legitimize racial divisions. The anthropologist Tony Bennett writes that anthropology is ‘the discipline which, in one way or another, made nonwhite people into different human beings from white people’ (Bennett 2015: 559 referencing W. S. Willis 1999). Graeme Turner writes that in Europe, ‘national identity is synonymous with cultural purity’ and that ‘against such a model, a nation such as Australia looks bogus’ (1994:  122). Furthermore, ‘settler/ postcolonial societies face enormous problems in articulating a common identity across competing forms of ethnicity and against a history of occupation and dispossession of the original inhabitants’ (Turner 1994: 123). Turner argues that identity must be plural – identities not identity (ibid.). As such, one could argue that there must be space for multiple cultures. This study explores how the arts studio allows for and also limits the possibility of multiple cultural expressions. Despite the call for multiple views and spaces of identities and cultures, Australia’s ‘multicultural programmes have become increasingly assimilationist … while perpetuating long-standing forms of racial sequestration with regard to Indigenous Australians’ (Bennett 2015: 561). For

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these reasons and many others, Bennett writes that there is good reason why the culture concept has fallen out of favour with anthropologists (2015:  548), but there are some concepts of culture which can be used to understand events inside the studio. Urban First Nations people are at pains to show their uniqueness from mainstream society due to the longer and more devastating histories of colonization and dispossession. Very remote Australia is constructed as the model upon which such First Nations identity expressions in the studio are built (see Gibson 2013: 5). There are multiple Aboriginalities across Australia, but their essences have been polarized in the binaries of authentic/inauthentic, traditional/non-traditional and remote/urban. Cairns, in particular, has a demographic and sociocultural make-up which is situated awkwardly between the urban and the very remote rhetoric of First Nations lived realities. Most of these discussions about art and identity production take place in a socially constructed dichotomy between remote regions and settled regions. Cairns is both a settled and remote space. First Nations artists describe themselves in both ‘authentic’ and ‘inauthentic’ terms. Their artworks are viewed and put forward as both traditional and contemporary, with various degrees and shades of nuance between those two concepts. Cairns is located in Far North Queensland at the base of the Cape York Peninsula. It is the regional hub for the Cape and all the major government services are available in Cairns, including the region’s largest hospital. The City is surrounded by sugar cane fields, bush land, world heritage listed rainforests and the Great Barrier Reef National Park. In 2010, when this research took place, the largest employment sector was the retail trade and accommodation and food services, employing over 25,000 people (Cairns Regional Council 2010a [online]). This was well above the average from the rest of Regional Queensland and made up almost 30 per cent of Cairns’ total employment numbers. Cairns continues to be a tourist hub for many different types of activities, and since the global financial crisis of 2007, there has been some hard times for this sector.1 During the 2010 fieldwork period, the Cairns-Atherton region encompasses 221,984 people, of whom 23,466 (10.6%) identify as First Nations and 14,593 (6.6%) people do not indicate any status (Australian Bureau of Statistics 2012 [online]). In some ways, these high percentages reflect the large number of people moving away from remote areas and into the City as well as those who have lived in Cairns for many generations. These numbers also reflect the Aboriginal communities in areas such as Mossman, Wujal and Yarrabah. In the City of Cairns, this statistical story does not change much as 13,057 (9.3%) of the



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140,236 total population identify as First Nations (Australian Bureau of Statistics 2012 [online]). Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders are not spread across the City evenly, however, as there are pockets where the population is as high as 14 per cent (Gordonvale) and 20 per cent (Manunda) of the total (Australian Bureau of Statistics 2012 [online]). Physical divisions between First Nations and mainstream populations still exist in Cairns through less draconian principles than Roslyn Kidd (see Kidd 1997) described. Socially, First Nations peoples are noticeably visible across the city. For example, Cairns Central (the major shopping mall in the heart of downtown Cairns) is a huge mix of tourists and locals. Stocklands Shopping Centre, located just 5 minutes up the highway, has a higher visible First Nations presence despite the fact that, on the whole, the shopping centres are very similar with regard to selections. Stocklands is located on the south end of what was locally known as the three ‘Ms’ neighbourhoods – Mooroobool, Manunda and Manora. I was warned by non-Indigenous locals to stay away from the three Ms neighbourhoods as they were ‘known places for trouble’ because they were the ones with a high First Nations population. Why people felt the need to even bring this information up in the first place is telling of the forms of racial bias that exist in the region. The TAFE campus is located near the downtown centre of the city but in the centre of family residences and neighbourhoods in Manunda, the highest population of First Nations people in Cairns and a classic M neighbourhood. I stayed on the edge of Manunda – not because of any intimidation of being closer but rather because it was central to the TAFE, the art centres, galleries and the markets. As someone without a car, I needed a central spot easily accessible by bus, cycle or feet. Unsurprisingly, the Three Ms had very poor bus service, making any choice of living there difficult for anyone without a car. Despite the physical separations of First Nations peoples across Cairns, representations of their art and cultures can be found all over the city. Cairns has a number of galleries, museums and art centres for its rather small population, and this plethora of spaces focusing on art can be seen as a product of the tourist industry. During July of 2011, domestic tourists numbered 324,074 and international tourists were at 70,443 (Dalton 2011 [online]). Almost 400,000 people a month during the tourist season can pass through Cairns and visit its shops, cruise to the Great Barrier Reef and visit the rainforests. The need to both entertain and engage with tourists and their dollars creates many venues to showcase the region. Increasingly during the 1980s, Aboriginal art was portrayed inside galleries and major exhibitions across Australia more and more, contributing to how

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Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art

people see or expect to see Aboriginal art. In 1984, the National Gallery of Victoria staged Kunwinjku Bim, Western Arnhem Land Paintings, followed up by The Face of the Centre: Papunya Tula Paintings in 1985 (Caruana 2000: 458). The 1989 exhibition, Dreamings: the Art of Aboriginal Australia, was on display at the Asia Society Galleries in New York and ‘introduced the overseas art public to the richness and diversity of styles, tradition, techniques and narratives encompassed by the phrase “Aboriginal art” ’ (Caruana 2000:  459). This exhibition introduced Aboriginal culture and religion as well as the political and economic contexts in art production through the analysis of the mediums, styles and meanings exhibited in the artworks on display. The exhibition was a great success, but like many subsequent volumes on Aboriginal art, it included a large gap in that it did not include any Torres Strait Islander art. Admittedly, being completely inclusive was not the purpose of the exhibition or its catalogue nor was it practically possible to include ‘everything’, but as the second, nationally recognized Indigenous group in Australia, the exclusion of Islander traditions is not insignificant. Dreamings was an incredibly important exhibition in the history of Aboriginal art in Australia, but it must be remembered that it had a narrow focus on a few regions. The success of the exhibition programme during the 1980s solidified in the public’s eye that the type of paintings included in the exhibition represented the scope of traditional Aboriginal art and this is not the case at all. Lorraine Gibson addresses this stereotype head-on in her book We Don’t Do Dots:  Aboriginal Art and Culture in Wilcannia, New South Wales, asking, ‘Why are notions and images of Aboriginal art and culture still dominated by those from the Central and North of the Australian continent, despite most Aborigines residing in the South-East?’ (2013: v). As will be demonstrated by the artists inside the TAFE studio, the idea of knowing the ‘scope’ of Aboriginal art – especially given the exclusion of Torres Strait Islander art production – was to create problems for artists living in Cairns. The creation of a stereotype and its working on Aboriginal artists from urban and regional areas is not a new idea and is well documented. As already mentioned, Gibson wrote a thorough treatise on the workings of the dichotomy of remote and very remote artists and urban and regional ones in her work (2013). She points out that ‘black and white [peoples] both recognise the value of Aboriginal art, but where primary ideas of what makes art, or artists, leaves most Aboriginal people at something of a disadvantage’ (2013:  140, original emphasis). Gibson argues that Aboriginal people are drawn into practicing art ‘without necessarily endorsing or understanding the field or the players, and,



Art and Identity

7

therefore, its possible implications’ (2013: 140). These implications can be public confrontations in galleries where potential buyers are looking for something specific and the art being represented does not fit those expectations. Lynelle Flinders of the Dharrba Warra Clan north of Cooktown wrote about her own experiences as a curator of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander artists in Cairns and the pressure of ‘having dots’. She writes: In 2011, I was part of a group of artists that exhibited in a pop-up exhibition as part of the Indigenous Art Fair in Cairns. This particular morning I was looking after the exhibition when a tourist came rushing through the gallery looking at the art on display. When I  asked if I  could help in any way he demanded ‘where are the dots?’ Not really sure what he was on about, I asked ‘what do you mean?’ He insisted, ‘The dot paintings. Where are the dot paintings?’ I said ‘Sir, that style is associated with central Australia. These paintings are by artists from Cape York as well as from the Torres Strait Islands. We have a different way of expressing our art here.’ He said, ‘No. I’m looking for dots’ and then he walked out. WELL … I thought. Is this how all Indigenous art is seen? As dots? (Stolte et al. 2015: 67)

In this exchange, dots are not an empty signifier but a direct reference for the art style of the Central Desert region of Australia where ‘dot paintings’ have become world famous.2 Any possible discussions of dot styles in Cape York, such as those of the Wik People of Aurukun, are not even possible in these situations due to the semantic meaning of the phrase ‘dot paintings’. ‘Dot paintings’ do not just mean paintings with dots; they mean paintings from a specific area of Australia. As both Gibson and Flinders have demonstrated, these stereotypes are very real for First Nations artists. First Nations art is not limited to the fine art galleries in Cairns, and there are many examples of art catering to tourists. Tourist art are those works which are done for the tourist trade and include painted artefacts such as didgeridoos, bullroarers, boomerangs and clapsticks and paintings and prints which depict a certain expression of Aboriginal cultural representation. These works are part of the public conversation on the nature of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander art. A student at the TAFE worked part-time at a shop called Universal Joint selling paintings and didgeridoos. He told me about the buying practices of the owner – saying he respected what went on in the shop on the whole as the owner treated the local artists with respect and paid a fair market price for their labour. Although the paintings were bought on trips to the Northern Territory,

8

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art

the didgeridoos were locally made by Yarrabah artisans and were sold for a retail price anywhere between $200AUD and $500AUD. Didgeridoos are considered a hallmark of Aboriginal material culture but they are not local to Cairns First Nations peoples. In point of fact, didgeridoos are not local to any Queensland First Nations peoples and yet are made throughout the state for the tourist trade. The student I spoke with did not have issues with selling didgeridoos but did have some trouble with the representation of dot paintings and x-ray works in Cairns, saying that he personally did not want to paint in that way and that the plethora of images from out of state available in Cairns skewed both local artist and tourist perceptions of what local Aboriginal art should be. There is a distinct difference though that must be made in the kinds of shops available and their business practices: those who sell works from local artists and those who sell works imported from Indonesia. Indonesian-made didgeridoos and boomerangs  – as well as paintings, clapsticks and statues – can be found all over the city in speciality shops along the streets and inside shopping malls. Items are decorated with ‘Aboriginal’ motifs such as cross-hatched lines in red, white, yellow and black. There are ‘x-ray’ kangaroos, lizards and turtles and didgeridoos covered with ‘dot paintings’ and concentric circles. Items like these help perpetuate a stereotype of Aboriginal art (Torres Strait Islander styles are not included in this cultural copying) which has a number of unintended consequences on the artists working in the TAFE studio. There are also a number of consequences on the First Nations art market in Cairns as these didgeridoos typically sell for under $50AUD. On a trip to Cairns in 2012, I was able to sit down and chat with a proprietor of a small Aboriginal art gallery which sold locally produced paintings and artefacts. Edina Grünewald has been working with local First Nations artists for years through her Didgeridoo Hut shop, located in downtown Cairns near the bus mall. She buys what she calls ‘authentic Aboriginal art’ and advertises it through signs on her shop door as well as sandwich boards on the street. She protests the unchecked importation of Indonesian artefacts which pass as ‘Aboriginal’. Like Universal Joint, the Didgeridoo Hut sells didgeridoos from between $200AUD and $500AUD which Grünewald says reflects the fair price she pays the artists. She explained to me some of the unfair business practices which went along with the Indonesian artefacts such as removing the ‘Made in Bali’ sticker and yet continuing to claim GST importation costs from overall profits. This keeps the prices of the items down. ‘Why would you pay $300 for a didgeridoo when next door there is one being marketed as “Aboriginal” for only $40? This totally confuses the buyer!’



Art and Identity

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In 2018, the plethora of fake art from Indonesia finally made national headlines. Bob Katter, the Australian federal member for Kennedy, Queensland, published a press release on the issue of fake art. He writes: ‘Our First Australians are being taken for a big ride … it would appear that about 80–90% of all supposed Aboriginal, Torres Strait Islander artefacts are not made in Australia nor painted or designed in Australia but in fact are made overseas.’3 The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission alleges that ‘the passing off, for commercial gain, of artwork or cultural objects as being hand-painted or made by Australian Aboriginals may be considered within Indigenous Australian communities to be culturally demeaning and their supply and sale has the potential to lead to the undervaluing of authentic Australian Aboriginal artwork’.4 This sentiment is echoed by Jonathon Saunders, a resource and development officer for the Association of Northern, Kimberley and Arnhem Aboriginal Artists (ANKAAA) who writes, ‘we’re losing an actual authentic expression of Indigenous culture’.5 The consequences of this preoccupation with very remote sections of Australia and their art styles are manifold. Funding bodies have absorbed this form of being First Nations in their grant schemes and acquittal processes, skewing discussions and concerns towards those of very remote artists. This endeavour to help remote artists leads to policies that are applied to First Nations artists all across Australia. For example, one of the key recommendations for the First Nations arts industry is the creation of an Indigenous Arts Code. The discourse of the Dreamtime – as the exhibition Dreamings has helped define through the emphasis of First Nations art’s mythic narrative and of the ceremonial (Sutton 1989)  – has permeated popular culture and expectations of First Nations art with unintended consequences. This permeation is illustrated in the Senate Inquiry’s recommendations. The recommendations for art practitioners are to take up the Indigenous Art Code and their certificate of authenticity in the sale of artworks. This certificate was meant to prevent carpet bagging and illicit arts practices, a problem which was made quite clear in the Report’s findings (see Chapter 8, pp. 97–106). This certificate asks artists for information as outlined by the Report: a picture of the artist and the work; a description of the size and appearance of the work; a description of the story that the art work represents; the name, location and contact details of the arts centre or association that is identifying the work; and

10

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art an authorising signature from a person representing the art centre or association. (Senate Standing Committee on Environment 2007: 120)

The example on the very last page of the Report also includes information on the artist’s ‘skin name’ and because the artist is from the Central Desert region, their jukurrpa or Dreaming (Senate Standing Committee on Environment 2007: 235). Certificates of authenticity used in Cairns by the regional art centre hub include some of these pieces of information such as a photo of the artist, a photo of the artwork with dimensions and construction, provenance, a space for the story and the artist’s tribal group. Many artists I  worked with had a problem with affiliating with a tribal group. Some students do not know their tribal identity – they simply identify as Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander. Most however had issues with answering this question because they possessed a mixed and oftentimes diverse heritage and did not want to limit themselves artistically by using a single label. Tommy Pau, an active participant and figure in this book, commented on his identity this way: I am an Australian with heritage from Australian Aborigines, Torres Strait Islander, Asia, New Guinea and South Pacific. Every phase of my life I have been influenced, leaned onto, learnt and experienced one of my blood lines. For example, my Asian influence is through martial arts and Asian food. I connected with my New Guinea bloodline when I lived on my parent’s home island with my big ama (my mum eldest sister). I appreciated my Aboriginal bloodline living on the mainland in Aboriginal communities. With a diverse background confusion is always present and one can be lost in developing an identity. I, therefore, define myself as an Australian and have pride in being called an Australian or Indigenous Australian of Torres Strait decent. The culture I practice is mainly Torres Strait Islander culture, as it is the culture I was raised up on. But does that makes me solely a Torres Strait Islander because I was raised in that culture? I do not have fuzzy hair or dark skin and I do not speak traditional language. Therefore it is best for me to tell you my identity than it is to be classified by geographical upbringing. I cannot be solely identified by geographical upbringing as it is a gross injustice to my ancestral bloodline that is present in my existence. Having a label placed on you restricts you from drawing inspiration from a rich background and aids in the denial of a rich ancestral heritage forcing one to create false identities and fit a mould that will have gaps in it. Locale should not



Art and Identity

11

be a square enclosing artistic inspiration and disabling artist development and creativity for an artist to draw inspiration from his or hers ancestry tree.6

Tommy was disappointed at having to put down as his ‘tribal group’ ‘Thursday Island/Erub (Darnley) Island’ because he felt it would limit how the art market was going to perceive his work and what he would be allowed to do. This is an example of just one of the many ways in which the First Nations arts industry in Cairns – with all its good intentions – is at odds with contemporary reflections of self and the aspirations of artists. This tension can be framed in part by concepts of culture and how they act upon First Nations peoples. By far, the most accessible market available to new artists is the tourist trade. With potentially almost 400,000 visitors a month during the Dry Season, tourists are seen as prime buyers for artworks. I met many artists who were once students at the TAFE’s First Nations art programme who sold their works at the weekend markets. More of this issue will be discussed in subsequent chapters but suffice to say, with the fine art galleries and commercial galleries offering only intermittent opportunities at best, the tourist trade was the most immediately lucrative avenue for revenue students had at their disposal. Works sold this way however had a different sense of artistic credibility and there were many debates surrounding what was and what was not for the markets. Some of these issues are mitigated through innovative new markets and one shining example of this is the First Nations run organization, UMI Arts. UMI (as it is commonly referred to) is named after the creole word used often in the Cape region to mean ‘you and me’. Established in 2005, UMI Arts is a non-profit organization with an all First Nations board of directors. During its first years, the director was Lisa Michl, a graduate of the TAFE First Nations arts programme. UMI describes itself as ‘the peak Indigenous arts and cultural organisation for Far North Queensland, an area that extends north of Cairns to include the Torres Strait Islands, south to Cardwell, west to Camooweal and includes the Gulf and Mt Isa regions’ (UMI Arts 2009 [online]). Membership is free for First Nations artists from these regions only. Membership for nonIndigenous arts organizations, or those interested people, is for a fee. UMI’s focus is ‘to strengthen Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander cultural practices, including visual arts and crafts, dance, ceremony, storytelling [sic] and music’ (ibid. [online]). UMI puts on an impressive array of activities, events, workshops and exhibitions centred on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander arts. Their Exhibition Ready programme takes inexperienced artists through the process

12

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art

of designing, preparing and setting up exhibitions. Groups and people who have participated in this event come from all over Cape York. From New Mapoon, to the Torres Strait Islands, to Hope Vale and Yarrabah to local artists and students from the TAFE, the UMI Exhibition Ready programme has catered to a diverse range of artists. UMI also has a monthly art market for artisans, musicians and dancers during the dry season. Once a year, they put on the Big Talk One Fire event which showcases First Nations talent in what they bill as the Far North Queensland’s Premier Cultural Festival (UMI Arts 2012 [online]). Recently, UMI has developed their Side by Side Programme where UMI Arts members run workshops for other members to share knowledge and expertise. As a First Nations peak body, UMI was and continues to be open to criticism about its intentions and objectives. I have been told by some members that UMI has a level of nepotism involved in its practices and the people it chooses for such programmes like Exhibition Ready or Side by Side. Other artists feel that the responsibility and obligations of being involved in higher decision-making processes are not appealing to most artists. The preference is to defer positions of power to others while continuing to make critiques from the outside. It is very difficult for UMI to be all things to all people and I would not debate these views. From personal experience, I have seen artists assert themselves and their identity in dealing with UMI while at the same time I have seen UMI come into its own as an organization that believes in what it is doing and has the confidence to stand against naysayers. The most important aspect about UMI is the fact that it is a First Nations organization which allows for and even stimulates debates such as these with resolutions which are rooted in First Nations agency. There is no other place in Cairns like UMI for First Nations artists and the communities they represent and the organization plays a very important role in developing the rhetoric of the First Nations arts industry in the region.7 In order to understand the perspectives on Aboriginal and Islander identity in Queensland through the production of visual material, understanding how did First Nations art begin in Queensland is crucial. Students stepping into the studio are stepping into a specific art historical milieu which influences the way the course is structured, how students see First Nations art and how First Nations art is received publically. How do First Nations students, new to the arts industry, reflect on their sudden newfound identity as Aboriginal or Islander artists? In what ways are the images displayed around town internalized and reproduced in their own artworks? This book explores the kinds of images First Nations artists use in their artworks and why those artists make the choices they do. Further, it looks at the images produced inside the studio – not just the ones



Art and Identity

13

for exhibit – to try and see if there is a difference between what students put out in public and what they produce privately. Although many cultural disruptions occurred with the coming of the First Fleet in 1788, artefact production was a continuous process for many communities in remote Cape York regions. Lindy Allen wrote a brief history of collecting in Queensland in the Queensland Art Gallery’s Story Place: Indigenous Art of Cape York and the Rainforest catalogue. In it, she writes how contact with ‘outsiders’ goes back to the 1600s and no doubt included the trade of desirable items (Allen 2003:  30). Early systematic collection of artefacts  – what Allen calls ‘scientific collecting’ – happened during the 1800s and was facilitated by sailing ships travelling around the Cape York region. With the establishments of settlements like Cardwell in 1862 and the Port of Somerset in 1863, easier access attracted ‘both collectors and those interested in biological and social evolutionary theories’ (Allen 2003:  32). Allen writes that ‘museums and collectors alike sourced artefacts from local police, police magistrates and local residents’ (2003: 33). Details on what types of artefacts were collected are indicated through the requests by Queensland Museum director Dr R. Hamlyn Harris; he asked for materials from the Mitchell River Mission such as ‘shields, wooden and bark containers, bags and other materials’ in 1911 (Allen 2003:  33). Walter Roth, the protector of Aborigines at the turn of the twentieth century, encouraged collecting from regional offices and made Cooktown the ‘depot for arranging, sorting and labelling’ those artefacts (Allen 2003: 34). Roth especially has been noted for his thoroughness in collecting artefacts and material objects of interest (see Kahn 2008). Allen notes that some two thousand artefacts made their way to the Australian Museum in 1898 (ibid.). Additionally, anthropologists such as Norman Tindale (see Jones 2008), Ursula McConnel (see Perusco 2008) and Donald Thompson (see Allen 2008) all made multiple trips to Cape York, collecting artefacts and taking photographs (Allen 2003:  34). Alfred Cort Haddon’s Cambridge expedition to the Torres Strait in 1898 produced a huge collection of artefacts which were published in later years (1935). Of additional interest is Roth’s observation that trade was happening between communities and not just between First Nations communities and European settlers. Roth wrote that in 1898, the trade of artefacts had slacked compared to earlier days but noted that bark blankets made by the people of Cardwell were still traded for dilly bags made by the people of Tully River (Allen 2003: 33). Collecting by anthropologists and museums was one aspect of the engagement between First Nations craftsmen and mainstream organizations. However, with

14

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art

such careful collecting and recording of artefacts from an early period, there is a misunderstanding and a tension in the representation of First Nations art in Queensland. This tension between institutions and their understanding of First Nations arts and how individuals conceptualize themselves as artists comes about in part due to a lack of recognition of the historical underpinnings working on the industry today. In Dreamings, Sutton comments on the barriers to the reception of Aboriginal art and writes, ‘Whether it was because of their rarity, the abstruseness of their culture of origin, or the low esteem in which their makers were held, Australian Aboriginal works in the past failed to capture the attention of the European and North American art world’ (Sutton 1989: 34). Hints of this engagement can be found in Roman Black’s book, Old and New Australian Aboriginal Art (1964). Roman Black’s Old and New Australian Aboriginal Art is an intriguing take on ‘Aboriginal’ art. Old Aboriginal art, according to Black, is that art which might be conceived of as ‘traditional’. This includes shields, bark paintings, rock art galleries, engraved baobab nuts, tree carvings, spears and boomerangs. The first two-thirds of the book are devoted to such items. Black’s goal is to create a general sense of what ‘old’ Aboriginal art is. For example, Black writes the churingas of Western Australia are typified by ‘longitudinal zig-zags, concentric squares, rhomboids, lozenges, triangles, herring-bone, and angular meanders’ (Black 1964: 36). Black’s work is surprisingly detailed in those things he chooses to highlight as ‘old’ Aboriginal art. The last third of Black’s book focuses on ‘new’ Aboriginal art and this art is defined by Black as art which is based on ‘old’ Aboriginal art but produced by white Australians. Of particular interest to Black is Margaret Preston’s works. In showing her a piece of African art, Black quotes Preston as saying it was ‘wrong’ because ‘it’s not primitive enough. It is too civilised’ (Black 1964: 125). Her call then to look to Aboriginal artworks for inspiration is based on the legitimization of First Nations culture as primitive ‘enough’. Other artists Black explores include Douglas Annand, Bryam Mansell and Gert Sellheim (Black 1964: 126– 38). Bryam Mansell’s work is noteworthy and praised by Black because of his incorporation and invention of Aboriginal myths to go with his paintings of Aboriginal themes (Black 1964:  136–7). There is also some discussion on William Constable’s Corroboree, ‘The Fire Ceremony’ dance. Black emphasizes the importance of white artists and the incorporation of Aboriginal motifs in their artworks – he calls this ‘applied Aboriginal art’ (Black 1964: 147). The importance of Black’s book is not just because of the attempt to develop an Aboriginal art history but because of what this book says about



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public expectations of Aboriginal art. Black’s book was published in 1964, five years after the development of Queensland Aboriginal Creations (QAC), the Brisbane-based curio shop supporting various cottage industries across the state of Queensland. This book helps not only illustrate how Aboriginal fine art was able to make it into the public sphere but also illustrates how the stereotyping of Aboriginal art began to seep into the public consciousness. Chris Healy’s Forgetting Aborigines (2008) discusses Aboriginal art during this early time period as well. Using the concepts of ‘Abo Art’8 and ‘Aboriginal’ art produced by white artists, Healy explores how Aboriginal art produced a type of forgetfulness with regard to the cultural copyright violations of white artists using Aboriginal motifs (Healy 2008:  68). Referencing Black’s book, Healy examines the ‘ambivalent culture space of Aboriginality’ which existed for a long time with regard to artistic production (Healy 2008: 69). Specifically, Healy argues that the remembering of Papunya as the beginnings of Aboriginal art is a process of forgetting the histories before those events and the market for Aboriginal kitsch and ‘Abo Art’ (Healy 2008: 72). For Black, according to Healy, old Aboriginal art was pre-contact: rock engravings, bark paintings, and so on while new Aboriginal art was art practised by white mainstream artists in an ‘Aboriginal’ style (Healy 2008:  79). Healy uses the term ‘Abo Art’ deliberately with this form of art production to both incite a reaction and to label forms such as Aboriginalia, Aboriginal kitsch, and ‘fine art’ inspired by Aboriginal motifs and styles (Healy 2008: 80). First Nations people were excluded from the high art category, and it was a necessary disappearance in order for their motifs to be used. In this way, the mining of Aboriginal art was used to ‘localise settler culture’ to a wider audience (Healy 2008: 84). Healy makes the radical conclusion that by forgetting Abo Art and focusing on Papunya as the source of Aboriginal art today, the art historical significances of Abo Art are ignored. According to Healy, Abo Art paved the way for modern art practices to be accepted and/or even looked at (Healy 2008: 89). The history of First Nations art in Queensland is pocketed across different publications with different degrees of detail. There are two catalogues of particular interest, published by the Queensland Government and Keeaira Press, which draw attention to First Nations artists in Queensland. The first catalogue was called Gatherings: Contemporary Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art from Queensland Australia and was compiled by Marion Demozay and an allIndigenous reference panel (2001). It included a very small introduction essay about the project as a whole but many full-colour images of artworks with small bios of the artists who created them. The first Gatherings was very popular and

16

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art

prompted interest in another volume. In Gatherings II: Contemporary Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art from Queensland Australia, Marion Demozay wrote a more extensive introductory essay which explores the early history of art, craft and curio production in Queensland (2006). It is one of the most comprehensive attempts at such a history. In her introduction, Demozay mentions QAC and the TAFE First Nations arts programme as key actors in the development of the arts industry in Queensland (2006: 32). Additionally, according to Demozay, ‘another major contribution towards the long-overdue recognition of Queensland’s First Nations art and its history was the Queensland Art Gallery’s 2003 initiative the Story Place: Indigenous Art of Cape York and the Rainforest, the first major exhibition to explore the historical and contemporary art of Cape York’s First Nations peoples’ (Demozay 2006: 11). Indeed, Story Place attempts to cover the entire ground of Aboriginal art history in Queensland and includes a wide range of articles covering aspects such as not only the history of the TAFE programme and QAC but also the people of Cape York, the history of collecting, basketry and weaving, as well as profiles of major artists and movements. The art historian Sally Butler included a few well-written but short paragraphs about the beginnings of QAC in her essay ‘Cape York’s Time in Motion’ (Butler 2003). Butler cites the role of Queensland tourism industry as key in the development of First Nations art production in the Cape. This resulted in people being ‘ignorant of any cultural context of the visual material and uncertain whether items were art, artefact or trinket’ (Butler 2003: 196). However, it is my contention that despite extensive collecting, history has been written with pockets of forgetfulness and the true story of Queensland First Nations art history has been blurred and generalized to the point of being destructive rather than constructive. I spent a year inside the Cairns TAFE studio, working with the artists and instructors. To say I was simply an observer would be misleading although I did record the activities in the studio. I was also hired as a studio assistant a month after the term started. I taught colour mixing and produced a few lectures on Western art history as requested by the lead instructor. I was also encouraged to participate in the painting and printing units which allowed me to understand the processes of art production as well as the learning techniques employed to pass on these processes. Because of my own Indigeneity, I  was frequently encouraged to produce works which reflected my heritage and was frequently teased when these works did not meet expectations. Beyond participant observation, I  conducted a number of structured interviews and personal histories of students in order to gauge their perceptions of the studio and of



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themselves. I also conducted research outside of the studio by attending the art markets, gallery openings, dance performances and cultural fairs which are a part of life in Cairns for Aboriginal and Islander peoples. New understandings about the nature of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander art are drawn out and detailed. For the first time, a complete outline of the historical underpinnings of the First Nations art market in Queensland is laid out alongside the development of the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander arts school in Cairns. This development is told by past and present participants through one-on-one interviews. Finally, there will be a detailed account and analysis of the types of motifs and styles of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander artworks, making clear the points of contrast between the two First Nations groups. Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander art students engaging in formal training for the first time are stepping into a quagmire of identity politics, colonialist histories and inter-/intracultural struggles. Within the art world of First Nations Australia is a hierarchy of categories and intercultural spaces where culture is both produced and reproduced, contested and dictated. Engaging with the First Nations art market means taking on board and struggling with a range of assumptions and expectations on one’s identity and modes of cultural (re)production. To break the stereotypes of First Nations art in Australia, the relationship between artists and their chosen motifs and a clear documentation of what design elements and motifs are utilized needs to be understood. The potential factors determining these choices make up the legacy of Queensland’s art policies as well as artists’ conceptions of self. Artists choose to paint those things that matter to them. How things matter and what is painted is explored in detail. The art produced by Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander students going through the TAFE studio was found to be determined and framed by four factors: (1) the history of the First Nations arts industry in Queensland; (2) the curriculum within the studio; (3)  experiences with the markets and galleries; and (4) students’ personal histories. The First Nations arts studio at the North Queensland Institute of TAFE in Cairns is a unique space where First Nations instructors teach First Nations students about First Nations art. This raises a host of questions about the process of teaching culture, conceptions and expectations about First Nations artistic practices and the engagement of students with the curriculum, the tourist art market and local art galleries. The arts studio is the nexus  – a seemingly bounded and yet unbounded space  – where the

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Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art

development of Queensland art production, the history of colonial regimes and popular perceptions about the First Nations art market all play out.

Notes 1 As of 2017, Cairns’ largest industry is the health care and social services sector. See https://www.cairns.qld.gov.au/region/facts (accessed 24 October 2018). 2 For a brief and accessible account of this movement, see the National Museum of Australia’s ‘Defining Moment’ synopsis, https://www.nma.gov.au/defining-moments/ resources/papunya-tula (accessed 19 June 2019). 3 Bob Katter (2018). ‘Indonesian “Aboriginal” art ripping off First Australians’ https:// www.bobkatter.com.au/module/latestNews/view/935/indonesian-aboriginal-artripping-off-first-australians-/media-releases (accessed 20 September 2018). 4 Angus Thompson (2018). ‘ACCC launches legal action over “Indonesian made” Aboriginal art’ https://www.smh.com.au/business/consumer-affairs/accc-launcheslegal-action-over-indonesian-made-aboriginal-art-20180322-p4z5r5.html (accessed 20 September 2018). 5 Stephen Stockwell (2018). ‘ “A bloody lot” of fake Indigenous art is being sold. Here’s how you can spot it’ http://www.abc.net.au/triplej/programs/hack/how-to-spot-fakeindigenous-art/9817052 (accessed 20 September 2018). 6 Transcript from unpublished lecture during the Cairns Indigenous Art Fair Symposium, 18 August 2011. Used with permission. 7 Importantly, UMI has no facilities for art production aside from their classes. Unlike the descriptions of art centre practices by researchers like Altman (1990, 2005) and Wright and Morphy (2000), art production in Cairns is done at home where artists are responsible for supplying their own materials. This is a crucial distinction when comparing art centres in very remote areas to UMI Arts as the support structures provided to artists are radically different. 8 This term is generally regarded as highly offensive but was used historically in several contexts as this section discusses. It is being used in this book as Healy uses it and is not condoned by the author in any way.

2

Curios and artefacts

How did the State government get involved in procuring, selling and encouraging the creation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander curios? Going through the State Archives, the narrative arc answering this question evolves and changes over the decades. The terminology for First Nations material culture changes from ‘curios’ to ‘artefact’ to ‘fine arts’, with a great deal of overlap but generally mirroring the changing policy approaches and reception of those items among the general public. In point of fact, there was already a booming market in curios and material culture between government agencies and individuals and First Nations communities throughout the State from the 1800s. As curator Lindy Allen’s work shows, collecting had been part of early contact history (2003) but the involvement of the State of Queensland went beyond procuring objects for museums. By focusing on the early twentieth century, the history of First Nations art as well as the legacy of Queensland Aboriginal Creations will become more nuanced. The 1930s were an interesting time because there was a major philosophical shift happening throughout the world with regard to First Nations peoples, their cultures and their status within the wider mainstream society they found themselves in. This philosophy was one which sought the improvement of dispossessed First Nations populations – who were facing poverty, domestic violence and substance abuse – with a reintroduction of ‘cultural’ material to be produced for commoditization. As Allen (2003, 2008), Jones (2008), Perusco (2008) and others have demonstrated, collecting was a form of salvage operation or a form of recording culture; now the encouraged production of artefacts was seen as a source of economic viability. Prime examples of these efforts are the programmes developed in Canada and the United States for the production of cultural material by the Inuit and Pueblo communities, respectively (Burton 1936; Potter 1999). This was the same key philosophy in the First Nations arts development of Queensland as it is this philosophy which was to link ‘culture’ to

20

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art

visual arts and other forms of material production. To understand how culture was used and viewed, the structure of governance in Queensland during this time needs to be clearly understood. During the early twentieth century, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders in Australia were under draconian control across the country. Queensland was particularly aggressive in its treatment of its First Nations population as Roslyn Kidd so thoroughly demonstrated in her book The Way We Civilise: Aboriginal Affairs  – the Untold Story (1997). Areas across the State were assigned local managers or ‘Local Protectors’ who were in charge of a range of activities including regulating physical movements of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders from a reservation-type system. These local managers were managed by the ‘Chief Protector of Aborigines’.1 Relevant to the development of art production in Queensland is the key decade of the 1930s and the Chief Protector at the time, John Bleakley. John William Bleakley was the Chief Protector of Aborigines in Queensland from 1914 until 1942, after years of being a shipping master and inspector of fisheries on Thursday Island (Evans 1979 [online]). Bleakley’s knowledge has been characterized as ‘built on common sense, hard work and accumulated experience, not on a liberal education and training in social anthropology or native administration’ (ibid. [online]). Regardless, Bleakley took up the mantel of amateur ethnographer and wrote extensively on Aboriginal culture (including religion, ceremonies, kinship and contemporary living conditions), contact history between Europeans and Aboriginal groups across Australia, and the history of the administration of settlements and the role of the missions (Bleakley 1961). Being the Chief Protector of Aborigines in Queensland meant fielding a number of requests and answering a range of questions. These requests included: inquiries about the meaning behind words (e.g. oonoonaba, ebagoola); the availability of books on ‘Aboriginal Australia’; permissions to film or photograph on missions and settlements (e.g. Cremer-Harris photographic expedition of 1933); granting permission and access for anthropological research; and the general day-to-day administration of the missions and settlements throughout Queensland.2 The protector’s duties also included satisfying a large number of requests for artefacts such as boomerangs.3 During Bleakley’s years as Chief Protector, he was very involved in the curio trade of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander material culture. One of the potential reasons behind Bleakley’s involvement could have been the sheer number of requests for First Nations curios. As the Chief Protector of Aborigines, Bleakley’s approach to Aboriginal and Islander welfare was complex. On one hand, he believed in the capacity of First



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Nations Australians to be productive members of society. Through his writings, Bleakley advocated for protectors to cultivate a ‘personal knowledge of the natives and learn to understand their language to facilitate the growth of confidence’ (Bleakley 1935: 48–9). A. P. Elkin writes in the foreword to Bleakley’s book on Aboriginal Australia that the Chief Protector ‘makes clear his regret that he and others in similar positions of responsibility, did not have the opportunity to be trained in social anthropology and in its application to native administration’ (1961). Bleakley criticized governments across Australia for being slow to recognize the true capacity and character of Aboriginal people which was initially assessed on misunderstandings and prejudices (Bleakley 1935: 39). On the other hand, Bleakley asserted that society was served best – and that Aboriginal and Islander people were happiest – if segregation between the two populations was maintained. Bleakley believed he found evidence of this through an examination of prison programmes in Western Australia where inmates were ‘happily working at farming, stock raising, and village development work’ (Bleakley 1935: 47). Further, he writes: It is noteworthy that the greatest success in industrialising the blacks was achieved where conditions provided for their segregation from the contaminating influences of the white man’s civilisation and for their indulging, as a recreation from the unfamiliar toil, in their native occupations and pastimes of hunting, fishing, ‘walk-about’, and corroborees. (Bleakley 1935: 47)

Bleakley was not going to be an administrator who tore down the barriers between communities, settlements and missions and the wider Queensland public. He saw children of both European and First Nations descent as a real ‘problem’ for society and gave lectures about how best to tackle the issue. Significant to this research, Bleakley was keen to engage First Nations Queenslanders in ‘industrious’ pursuits. To this end, Bleakley saw artefact production as an appropriately ‘industrious’ pursuit. To facilitate these pursuits, Bleakley engineered two major events which would set the stage for the First Nations art industry in Queensland: a window display in 1933 and a major exhibition in 1935.

The Tourist Bureau’s window display, 1933 In the early months of 1933, Bleakley began coordinating with the government Tourist Bureau on a plan to put on a window display of Aboriginal and Islander curios. This window was to be available during the tourist season for the display

22

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art

of ‘marine curios and aboriginal [sic] works of art’.4 On 19 December 1933, a memorandum from Bleakley to the protector on Thursday Island reflects that the window display is a way of ‘ascertaining whether there was any demand’ for such items by the general public.5 The reference to ‘works of art’ is a highly unusual and rare use of the phrase during this time in history. More often than not, requests for items from missions and settlements were asked for by ‘curios’. If settlements could not provide artefacts, there were other options. For example, another letter between Bleakley and the settlement at Cherbourg, dated 27 April 1933, states: With further reference to the communications concerning the display of curios etc. by the Government Tourist Bureau on behalf of this Department, I  have to state that the difficulty which would be experienced on your Settlement in procuring from natives good weapons as curios is realised, but it is considered that particular attention in your case might be given to the fancy work section.6

Fancy work in this instance is work which is crafted by women using modern techniques such as tatting, knitting and crocheting. This particular memo is interesting as well because it reflects the inclusive manner in which Bleakley went about encouraging communities to participate in the window display. Further along, the memo illustrates how the Tourist Bureau approached the communities by placing the selling of items as secondary to the display itself. I wish to impress upon you that the articles are required for display purposes only but of course it is possible that during the display offers will be made to purchase, and if there is no objection on the part of the Settlement it is proposed to allow the Tourist Bureau to dispose of the articles for which there is a demand at the conclusion of the display. Consequently the Superintendents have been requested to advise the minimum price which they will take for each article forwarded. The Tourist Bureau of course receives commission but the articles will not be sold unless the net proceeds to this Department are equal to, or in excess of the price stated by the Superintendent. The Department desires to make this display a signal success and I  shall be glad, therefore, of your co-operation in the matter, and as the Tourist season commences in the near future kindly forward a parcel at an early date.7

The correspondences during 1933 shed much light on the types of curios Bleakley’s office in Brisbane was seeking. Bleakley was determined to not only



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get quality items but also items which reflected the variety and diversity of his constituency. The window display ended up with a huge range of items from all over the Cape and included a variety of shells such as bailor, bugle and trochus as well as boomerangs and spears. No specific inventory list was found in the archives and no mention of any sales was recorded either. Only hints of Bleakley’s ultimate goal for the display – as a presentation of First Nations culture – are evident. An example is this memorandum from 6 June 1933 to the settlement on Palm Island: On looking over the articles it is found that there are no specimens of the following well-known native weapons:  Woomeras, Game Spears, Fish Spears. The only shields in this collection are those previously forwarded by you. It is thought that perhaps a pair which would be more of the type used in fighting would be better presentation. Those on hand have such small grip that it is evident they are merely models.8

Unfortunately, no photographs of the window display were found in the archive. However, the exercise surrounding the development of the window display is an important one. This is the beginnings of the type of negotiations between the market and the products which would take place for decades to come. The critique of items as being ‘merely models’ implies Bleakley may have had some knowledge of shield designs and it certainly illustrates his expectations of those objects. There was a learning curve happening between the departments in Brisbane, the communities and potential purchasers of First Nations curios which would help shape those very curios. Bleakley wanted ‘authentic’ and ‘traditional’ curios as if originating from museums and created in the same way as pre-contact times – only in mass quantity. For example, orders for boomerangs were frequently sent to the Queensland Department of Native Affairs throughout the year and Bleakley would run point on those requests. Requests came from both domestic and international universities and museums as well as school-age students, aficionados and collectors. The demography of the people and institutions requesting First Nations curios was varied and international. Countries included Germany, France, Italy, the United States, Canada, Mexico and Japan as far back as the 1940s.9 In a memo to Yarrabah, Bleakley remarked that some boomerangs would have to be returned because the potential buyer refused to purchase some of the items. Bleakley writes, ‘the buyer would have gladly taken the full dozen but felt that as they were obviously sawn out they were not true representations of native curios’.10 In fact, the ideal model of a boomerang was

24

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art

drawn out and forwarded to the communities from Brisbane. This was not the last time such a model would be handed out to Aboriginal communities. (I found no evidence of any models being sent to the Torres Strait.) Curios at this time could almost be classified as a revival of archaeological relics whereby the decades of colonization and dispossession could just disappear through following a design pattern. Further, Brisbane  – through Bleakley’s and his department’s memos – positioned itself as the authority on how these artefacts were supposed to be made. Brisbane’s expectations on First Nations artefacts superseded First Nations’ interpretations. Looking at curios specifically, one can find a range of different items requested and sold through the Queensland Tourist Board during the 1930s and 1940s, including weapons such as spears, shields, woomeras and boomerangs; Torres Strait baskets and fans; ‘marine curios’ such as ocean shells and turtle shells; ‘fancy work’ such as doilies, crotchet items and mats; and feather works like flowers.11 Communities contributing to the creation of these curios included Cherbourg, Cooktown, Palm Island, Thursday Island, Woorabinda, Mornington Island, Kowanyama, Yarrabah and potentially others not mentioned in the records. Sales were credited to communities and not individual artists as individual artist names were not given and therefore not recorded by the Tourist Board that acted as the point of sale. Typically, the Tourist Board sold the curio in question and then sent the receipts of sale which included a description of the item and the location of origin to the Chief Protector. The Chief Protector then sent out a memo acknowledging the sale and then proceeded to credit the account of the mission or settlement from which the item was originally obtained. The settlements and missions were responsible for keeping track of the artisans involved in the production of curios.12 This system of sales and credits represents an interesting relationship dynamic between bureaucrats in Brisbane, mission administrators and the nameless Aboriginal and Islander people who created the works being sold. Throughout the records, the emergence of a consistent individual Aboriginal or Islander identity – through the process of naming – was slow and sporadic up until even the early 1980s. That does not mean that individual craftsmen were completely unknown. On 27 October 1933, the Deputy Chief Protector of Aboriginals wrote a memorandum to Cherbourg’s superintendent and follows in part: I have to advise that two of the polished Bull Oak model boomerangs sent down by Christie Hill some time ago were sold on the 24th instant for 2/6d each and the sum of 5/- is being placed to the credit of your accounts.13



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Christie Hill was a prolific boomerang maker and known by name. However, this is a rare example of an artisan being named. Typically, senior management in Brisbane dealt on a very broad level with communities as units and not with individuals. This is important to note because of the implications this has in understanding the administration’s mindset towards curio production which saw Aboriginal and Islander people as a homogenous group of producers of curios. Arguably, this homogeneity was a result of the practical difficulty in dealing with so many individuals across a State as large as Queensland. It was simply easier to give power to the missions and settlements to track the production of individuals. However, further details in the records indicate that ease of administration was not the only aspect dictating the relationship between Brisbane and remote areas and that the ‘homogenous’ approach would have other far more damaging consequences.14

The Royal Jubilee National Exhibition, Brisbane, 1935 As should already be evident, there was enough of an existing public engagement with First Nations curios to encourage further production and support by the government structures in Brisbane to the outlying communities. The sheer volume of requests for artefacts and curios supports this interest as does the increase in tourism ventures to First Nations communities. Some of these demands are wellillustrated in the cruise tourism that existed along the Queensland coast during the 1920s and 1930s (see Martin 2014). In a letter from 29 September 1933, the cruise ship Ulysses requested a stop at Palm Island for the arrangement of a ‘native corroboree’ and a ‘native display’.15 Another cruise liner sent a letter on 24 March 1933 to request that the ‘visit of overseas tourists [be] as entertaining as possible’ on ‘native reservations’.16 Curio production and interest in Aboriginal culture was building in Queensland. In 1935, Bleakley would further facilitate this burgeoning industry by encouraging State-wide participation in producing a display at the Brisbane Royal National Show – the first of its kind in 19 years.17 The reasons behind this long lapse of First Nations representation at the annual show are not known. One newspaper article used the word ‘revival’, indicating either some lack of interest on the part of the government or a renewed interest and/or activity on First Nations communities.18 Throughout the records from late 1934 and the early part of 1935, Bleakley corresponded tirelessly to the communities, settlements and missions about participating in the Show through the production of crafts, curios, traditional

26

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art

items, fancy work, basketry, shells, adornments, mats, weapons, bones and more. Preparation for the exhibit included not only produce and examples of children’s schoolwork but also carved emu eggs, ‘witchcraft and items of magic’.19 On 28 June 1935, The Telegraph wrote an article about the upcoming Brisbane Exhibition and the promised display of First Nations works. ‘For the first time for 19 years a display of aboriginal [sic] handiwork is to be shown at the Brisbane Royal National Show this year. The exhibits will include a collection of marine products, from raw pearl shell to turtle eggs.’ The article featured photos of a ‘perfect model of pearling lugger  – the work of settlement aborigines’ and a model of a Saibai canoe. Further, it focused on the agricultural industries such as farm produce and other ‘influences of civilisation’ which was potentially popular from previous exhibitions but was ignorant of any of the traditional crafts or curios Bleakley was encouraging the communities to send down.20 From the list of items which would make its way to Brisbane, there are quite a few standout curios. For example, one item from Murray Island was labelled as an ‘Isow Naui’ which was used in ‘pouri-pouri to bring about death of the person desired.’ Another item, also from Murray Island, was labelled as an ‘Aud (diamond fish teeth, charm for love women by men)’. The Aurukun Mission sent a bark canoe as well as ‘native arrowroot’, ‘grass tree gum used in making spears’ and ‘string tied around baby’s waist for protection’. A  majority of the 186 items were from the eastern Torres Strait islands like Murray and Darnley and were scheduled for sale or for the ‘Aboriginal Museum’. The items ranged from the more unique items just mentioned to more everyday items such as quilts, pillow slips, table cloths, dresses and examples of sewing. These standout items illustrate an important point: items collected were not just for potentially aesthetic reasons but as true curios or items of curiosity. The space allotted for the display of First Nations curios at the Brisbane Royal National Show was 63′ long × 18′6″ deep × 13′ high. This area was divided into five uneven sections, emphasizing the areas Bleakley’s office felt deserved the most attention. In a memo from 5 July 1935, the Deputy Chief Protector wrote that the majority of ‘good outstanding features’ would come from Yarrabah, the Torres Strait and Palm Island. Looking at the division of space, priority was given to those regions. With depth and height a constant, the length differentiating the five sections was as follows: Torres Strait had 18 feet; Palm Island had 15 feet; Yarrabah had 9 feet; Cherbourg and Woorabinda shared 9 feet; and the Missions shared 9 feet.21 The result of the display was a success. As already stated, no photo of this display was found in the archives, but a photo appearing in the Queensland



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government’s Public Relations Bureau’s News Bulletin shows another display of curios and artefacts which may have had a similar approach as the Royal National Show (Figure 1). The numerous items created a festive display of First Nations life as filtered through the department’s lens. The Telegraph reported on the Exhibition held on 24 August 1935 and it is worth quoting in large part. One of the most popular of the displays in the principal pavilion at the Exhibition this year has been the extensive collection of industrial exhibits from the various aboriginal [sic] settlements both Governmental and missionary, to which brief reference was made in ‘The Telegraph’ early in the week. Nineteen years have elapsed since the last Aboriginal Court formed part of a Royal National Association show, and the revival does credit to all concerned. … One has only to look even casually at these exhibits to see how great a work both Government officials and missionaries are doing for the natives and how readily the aborigines [sic] lend themselves to training not only in everyday industries but also in what may be called primitive arts. The artificial feather flowers from Palm Island, the pastel drawings of native children who have received tuition at the Convent School at Thursday Island, the beautifully carved and stained boomerangs of adults, the harness, tinware, and other handicrafts of native boys from the Murgon Rural School, and the needlework display from girls in domestic service all reveal standards of efficiency in these departments which go far to dispel the superiority complex of the white race towards their dark skinned brothers and sisters. Models of various vessels used by the aborigines [sic] in the fishing industry, and of the Government motor boat Melbidir, and examples of marine products marketed by the natives of Torres Strait and the Gulf have attracted particular attention, and many sales of these articles have been made. Particularly attractive are the beautifully polished pearl oyster, turtle and trochus shells, clam shells, and corals, and models of modern native dwelling, make a fine contrast with the old-time grass gunyah. A goodly array of farm produce shows how good a farmer the aborigine [sic] can become.22

The striking aspects of this article are the almost 180 degree reversal of focus from the previous article in June. Aspects of agricultural produce are reduced to a one-sentence blurb at the end of the article and instead, the focus is on the curios produced by Aboriginal and Islander craftsmen. While the first article talked about the ‘influences of civilisation’ through agricultural production, this article claims that the works on display ‘dispel the superiority complex of the white race’ over First Nations Australians. Using the rhetoric of the day, the writer gives attention to the ‘primitive arts’ on display and remarks on the successful

28

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art

sale of such arts. Another newspaper article from a bit earlier, 17 August 1935, quoted the Natives Affairs Department as selling as many as 50 boomerangs a day.23 The Exhibition display was a success and the possibilities of a new industry in Queensland was becoming more widely recognized.

International trends of government’s engagements with First Nations art production That there was an early interest in First Nations artefacts and traditional (pre-contact) crafts is clear, but there were larger policy issues developing at this same time. Why had nineteen years gone by without a First Nations showcase at the Brisbane Royal Exhibitions? Why have a showcase in 1935? The records do no indicate a reason for the long absence but the renewed interest aligns with an international trend happening during this time. The material culture of First Nations Australians was fast becoming seen as a path towards economic prosperity and Queensland was keen to facilitate this industry. The engagement between State governments and First Nations communities in the production and sale of items of material culture was something which was happening in North America as well and provides interesting parallels. In the 1900s, the Pueblo people of North America were dispossessed and living in New Mexico, in villages with low opportunities for jobs, education or advancement. In the 1920s, the Museum of New Mexico began to encourage the ‘revival of traditional ceramics’ among Pueblo women (Babcock 1995:  125). Barbara Babcock has written on the sentiment of the time, quoting extensively a 1925 museum worker’s own appraisal of the success of the pottery revival: Like all other races with an inferior mechanical civilization, the Indians readily accepted the material culture of the Americans, much to the detriment of their own art, health, and happiness. Tin pails replaced their beautifully decorated pottery vessels, destroying the erect posture of the watercarrier [sic] with the olla on the head, causing stooped shoulders from carrying a pail in each hand, and, besides, the loss of the creative desires and love for beauty, and gave more time for idleness, resulting either in a deadening inertia or giving vent to family quarrels and conflict … [a]‌ttempts to revive the pottery making in pueblos where the art has died out, are now being made, and it has been stated by a government official, that since the younger women have taken to the pottery making again, half the domestic troubles have disappeared.24 (Babcock 1995: 125–6)



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There are two important concepts at work in this sentiment: 1) Western culture – or ‘mechanical civilisation’  – destroying First Nations vitality and creating domestic and social strife; and 2) the restoration of material culture restoring this vitality and removing the ‘troubles’. This is a familiar theme. Kristin Potter demonstrates the same process of artefact revival and production for sale in her research on Inuit art (1999). According to Potter, ‘the Canadian government experimented with several social programs in an attempt to establish a higher degree of economic independence for the Inuit, while simultaneously trying to preserve their cultural integrity’ (1999:  39). The most successful of these programmes was one where Inuit artisans began to practice printmaking and carved small soapstone sculptures. Potter makes the point of attributing this success to the work and writings of James Houston along with the support of the Canadian government and the Hudson Bay Company and a post-Second World War atmosphere with concerns about national identities and the conditions of First Nations peoples. However, the Canadian historian Ken Coates sees this time period – from the 1930s to the post-Second World War 1950s – differently as First Nations people, typically located in remote areas of countries, ‘represented an affront to national norms’ (2004: 217). This was a time, Coates writes, where nations renewed their efforts to assimilate First Nations cultures through the removal of children, further dispossession from homelands and policies which ‘aimed at integrating Indigenous peoples, typically as individuals, into the national mainstream’ (Coates 2004: 219). Although this was the larger and arguably more damaging trend in First Nations policy decisions in the 1940s and 1950s throughout the world, engagement of the policies of government in the traditional arts of First Nations people was another activity which would shape First Nations cultural identity for decades to come. This was the policy of government involvement in arts production as a way of ‘renewing culture’ in order to bring about a better future for a minority population which was suffering from the lack of economic opportunities. In Australia, this rhetoric of ‘renewing’ culture was warped by the beginnings of the assimilation policy but there are parallels in the use of ‘cultural arts’ as an economic vehicle for prosperity. ‘Cultural arts’ were seen as the ‘solution’ to the ‘Indian problem’ in North America. Ironically, the logic was that after generations of removing people from their cultural traditions, the solution was to ‘reintroduce culture’ as a way of improving upon poverty and domestic violence caused by the very processes of dispossession. It is important to note that ‘culture’ is used in a very limited and targeted way. In no example mentioned does the revival of ‘culture’ include

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Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art

the reintroduction or creation of language programmes or the establishment of any form of religious ceremonial life. There is no focus on traditional food harvesting or any understanding or accommodation of kinship obligations or social structures. There is no talk about land usage, ownership or hand back. The ‘revival of culture’ included only those things which were marketable and unthreatening to established power relations. Going back to Queensland, this logic of culture is evident in the records. These cultural arts programmes as described by Potter and Babcock illustrate the top-down extrapolation of ‘culture’ onto the communities. It was the purse strings of the departments involved in cultural renewal projects which decided what was culturally appropriate (read marketable) and what was culturally inappropriate (read not marketable). It is now beneficial to look at how this marketing of material cultural played out in Queensland.

The curio to artefact years: Queensland native creations 1959–67 The move towards developing and supporting the curio industry in Queensland was well and truly underway by the 1950s. Bleakley had spent decades encouraging and providing outlets for the production, display and sale of Aboriginal and Islander material culture. Enough requests were now circulating to foster H. R. Pascoe’s expedition to the Far North of the state. Pascoe was the ‘former manual arts training teacher’ from Cherbourg (Butler 2003: 196) and could well be considered the ‘father’ of Queensland Aboriginal Creations (QAC). He was the very first manager of the department as well as the man who did most of the initial legwork to get the organization up and running and funded. On 19 December 1958, Pascoe left Brisbane for Thursday Island on the M.V. Waiben for the purposes of ‘examining the potential market for native curios on the Queensland Coast and in Thursday Island and to arrange, where possible and practicable, the manufacture of these articles to meet public demand’.25 Butler suggests additional reasons for Pascoe’s ‘Curio Project’, pointing to the collapse of the trochus and pearl shell industry on Thursday Island as creating the need for alternative economic opportunities (Butler 2003:  196). Further, Butler suggests that ‘an arts and crafts industry offered a viable alternative, and appeared particularly favourable at the time because of the recent success of Albert Namatjira’ (ibid.). Pascoe’s report from 15 January 1959 makes the following points and recommendations about the future development of a First Nations arts centre in Brisbane. He claimed that:

●●

●●

●●

●●

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‘tourist islands’ are ‘lacking in articles attractive in design and representative of Queensland industry and life’; Townsville had few opportunities for the ‘disposal of native creations’ while Cairns was considered ‘the centre from which our articles could be distributed’; there was a local market in North Queensland ‘capable of absorbing every type of article that our scheme can produce’; and Cherbourg would be the main centre for manufacturing due to the Settlement’s ‘individual control, proximity of available markets, and the lack of isolation’ as compared to Thursday Island.26

With Pascoe staying on in Cherbourg to ‘undertake preliminary work in the setup of a manufacturing work shop’,27 officials in Brisbane continued promoting and developing the shop which would facilitate the sale of the curios. What is of keen interest is the government’s own conceptualization of what it was doing. The memo subject headings of the correspondence during this time period read as ‘Establishment Curio Industry’. Much of the correspondence in the archives centres on gauging the marketability of curios and Torres Strait seashells. Pascoe’s stay in Cherbourg developed the workshop for boomerangs and potentially other, unstated but hinted at, curios. On 20 March 1959, Pascoe writes that the undersecretary has approved of the purchase of ‘machinery as a prelude to the setting up of a factory at Cherbourg for the production of curios in quantity’. In that same letter, Pascoe goes on to boast: it is pleasing to report that having been advised that only good quality items will be accepted by what in the future will be known as the Queensland Native Creations Centre in Brisbane, the natives without any supervision and working in their homes now make and decorate boomerangs to a very high standard [the] quality and price of which will be unrivalled.28

The market was available and there was a demand for these items so the missions and settlements were being prepped for their production. Now that Brisbane thought they had learned what tourists were looking for, it was time to teach First Nations communities how to produce curios en masse. What did the ‘establishment of a curio industry’ entail? Further insight into how the government saw this scheme is provided in earlier correspondences and publications. The government’s Public Relations Bureau’s newsletter from 28 November 1958 states that the ‘Department of Native Affairs hopes to establish a new industry – the manufacture and sale of curios and tourist mementoes by

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Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art

aboriginals [sic] in Queensland’.29 A draft memo from 1 December 1958, days before Pascoe would leave for Thursday Island and just months before QAC would be ‘born’, states: You no doubt are aware that the Queensland Government in its policy for the greater encouragement of aboriginal [sic] and Torres Strait Islander arts and crafts and to likewise further the earnings of these people in its aim to make them more industrially independent than they are now has promulgated a scheme for the manufacture and marketing of Queensland Native creations through the Department of Native Affairs. … My Department is prepared to build small factories and to utilise native labour in the production of every type of article suitable to the household requirements but mainly to the Tourist Trade. The Tourist Trade is stressed primarily because it is felt that Australia can produce – and in this instance my Department can be the organising medium for such – these unique articles so desired by the public at reasonable cost but not available to them.30

The scheme was also looking at making Aboriginal and Islander people ‘more industrially independent’ – a phrase echoing similar words used to describe the Inuit and Pueblo arts programmes almost two decades earlier. A memo from Pascoe to the Department of Native Affairs on 28 September 1959 states: The Curio Industry with its objective to offer both Island and Mainland natives an opportunity to exploit their own original culture by either personal or organised diligence to their own benefit, has now established the centre from where supplies of native curios and novelties can be distributed to markets much further afield than hitherto. … Mention could be made that from the organised and steady quantity supply of boomerangs at a reasonable price some men from Cherbourg Settlement earn well over £10 per week apart from ordinary wages. It is hoped that the men and womenfolk of every Mission Reserve and Settlement will earn similar monetary benefits and at the same time proudly display the arts and crafts of their people.31

This statement says much about the expectations the government had with regard to curios. Firstly, there was a clear link between artefact production and economic prosperity as a possibility with the ‘exploitation’ of First Nations culture. Secondly, the concept of First Nations people exploiting their culture is not seen as problematic but here again, there is a very distinct use of the word culture in reference to physical objects. Queensland Native Creations went about the business of gathering stock from around Queensland to meet the needs of



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the City of Brisbane’s tourist industry. In a memo from 2 September 1959, a list of requested stock items was made in preparation for the cruise liner Mariposa’s arrival. It reads in part: All authentic looking weapons etc., such as shields, woomeras, stone axes, native headdresses, spears (one type in particular), nulla nullas, killer boomerangs. A suggested quantity would be 60 of each. It is stressed that these articles should not be modernised in any way.32

There is a disconnect between the making of these items in mass quantities and the additional stipulation that the articles not be modernized. On one hand, one can read this as requesting a performance of Aboriginality on par with an almost Henry Ford-like production. The message is akin to a command along the lines of: be Aboriginal but be Aboriginal in our stated ways – such as the sketching of boomerang models – and be Aboriginal fast and in quantity. The Mariposa was to arrive on 16 October – giving the First Nations communities about six weeks to make and then ship all the requested items. It was as though the bureaucrats thought they could just ‘tap into’ an Aboriginal production line and have that line respond. Native Creations was working hard however to give this industry a proper go by providing technical support. In addition to building the boomerang factory in Cherbourg, other support came in the development of guidelines for communities. A letter from 30 July 1959 details care and treatment of trochus and pearl shells.33 A booklet on how to throw a boomerang was being drawn up and labels authenticating the curios were being designed (Figure 2).34 Additionally, there was feedback from customers which was helping mould the process of both producing and selling curios. A letter from Currumbin Tea Gardens from 31 August 1960 complained about the quality of the Palm Leaf Hats. The manager writes, ‘the hats were extremely low and loosely woven in the crown and appear to have been badly crushed. … My only special requirements are that the hats be made large enough to wear – we have found in the past the they are on the small side and very often only fit for small children to wear.’35 Brisbane responded, requesting adjustments and better oversight from mission and settlement supervisors as they would continue to do for decades to come. Purchasers’ demands for authenticity and their expectations of the quality of the curios were brought to the attention of Native Creations which was then passed onto the communities. This was an interesting first decade of curio production as Brisbane, the market and the communities found their footing in this new industry.

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Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art

The name ‘Queensland Native Creations’ lasted until 1967 when it was restructured36 into QAC  – an interesting choice of naming since people from the Torres Strait were quite heavily involved in the curio industry since the very beginning and the new name did little to indicate their involvement.37 The change of name and the treatment of cultural artefacts as commodities – with all the headaches of commercialization such as customer feedback and complaints, dealing with broken items, stock stakes and end of year reports – say much about how Queensland was addressing concepts of culture. The best examples of culture as commodity are clearly the years between 1967 and 1984, and it is these years – and the sticky question of cultural content – which will be addressed next.

The legacy of QAC Curios came to QAC through two means: they were either sent to Brisbane by the communities, missions and settlements or the manager of QAC would travel throughout Queensland on buying trips to those communities. The first crucial consideration for these years can potentially be summed up in the following assumption held by most bureaucrats during these years: Aboriginal tribes across Australia were essentially the same ‘culture’. Bleakley’s book, published after his death but which summed up the years of knowledge he felt he had gained while being the Chief Protector of Aborigines, was called The Aborigines of Australia (1961). In it, he talked seamlessly about Aboriginal people in the Northern Territory, Western Australia, South Australia and Queensland as a single concept, with specific examples being used but no real attempt at differentiation. Examples used were exemplars which could be applied anywhere. Queensland Native Creations had just changed its name to QAC, amalgamating the tribes across the state into a single unit encompassing as well the Torres Strait Islanders who had participated in the curio market since the very beginning. There was in fact a breakdown of distinction across Australia which was not unique to Queensland. A  good example of the breakdown of cultural borders is the wholesale buyer in Victoria, called Arnhem Art, purchasing boomerangs and bullroarers from QAC.38 This approach by QAC – of seeing Aboriginal people as a single people and denying the many First Nations Australians that exist – would have lasting effects. As already mentioned, the Inuit and the Pueblo benefited from government programmes investing in ‘traditional cultural’ arts as a method of improving



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their living conditions and getting those communities involved in mainstream economics. A further interesting phenomenon was the way these government programmes tried to match ‘like with like’ in their reintroduction of cultural artefacts. In 1924, the Pueblo of Jemez was encouraged to participate in pottery making due to the success of the Zia and San Ildefonso Pueblos. The Jemez were given photographs of excavated pottery shards and designs which were found and identified in the New Mexican museums as specifically Jemez (Halseth 1925: 148). Zia people were given photographs of Zia pottery and the same was done with San Ildefonso, all done through archaeological excavations and findings. It is beyond the experience of this author to critique if these photographs really were as Pueblo specific as Halseth writes but it is important to note the detailed explanation of the efforts which went into the attempt to match cultural material with their proper cultural owners. There was at least an attempt at recognition in New Mexico, in the 1920s, to see the individual Pueblos as unique and different from each other. This was the case with the Inuit as well with the encouragement of their traditional activity of soapstone carvings. Fast forward 40  years and thousands of kilometres away to Australia and that recognition vanishes. QAC is today infamously remembered for importing Arnhem Land bark paintings into Queensland and across the communities and settlements for copying and selling. Although quite easy to demonize this today, when the practice started, there was very little understanding of regional difference, cultural copyright or the ownership of stories and designs as we are now familiar with them. The movers and shakers of these policies were bureaucrats – not anthropologists or art historians. With this in mind, I will turn directly to the best examples of these policies at their worst, the bark paintings. The production of bark paintings happened in Queensland through the production of bark ‘blanks’. If Cherbourg was to be the boomerang factory of Queensland as Pascoe had set up, then Hope Vale was to become the producer of bark blanks. ‘Blanks’ were collected and cured in Hope Vale and then shipped to Brisbane for distribution among the local artists for painting. Ironically, despite the rhetoric of wanting to encourage economic prosperity for communities, boomerang blanks were also shipped to Brisbane in the same vain. Local artists from Hope Vale obviously had an interest in painting barks and there are a few examples in the records of locally painted items but these barks posed a problem. In an excerpt from a letter from A. V. Istead, manager at QAC at the time, to the Hope Vale community manager J. McCauley, on 5 March 1968:

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With regards to Barks, I had in mind good plain barks which we urgently require but I  am always interested in local Bark Paintings, however price is usually a problem. Our bark painters are very proficient fast workers who can made [sic] a very good living from painting on boomerangs and barks, indeed two or three are paid more than I am. Our usual prices for quality barks are – Extra small

$1–75

Small $2–30 Medium $3–20 Large $4–75 Extra Large

$6–00

These prices also include the piece of bark. I would be most interested to know how this compares to your ideas of prices. I look forward to seeing the barks you are sending and sincerely hope they are to expectations.39

Putting the comment about First Nations painters in Brisbane making more money than the manager of QAC to one side, this excerpt demonstrates some of the economic rationale and assumption which went into bark painting production. This attitude seems quite contrary to the initial desires of Pascoe and company who saw the cottage industries in remote communities as real paths to economic advancement. What some of these communities ended up actually doing was providing the ‘canvases’ for other artists to use. In some ways, this is spreading the opportunities out to a broader range of participants. On the other hand, as this excerpt demonstrates, it also puts limits on people living in remote areas to earn money – one can only assume that the price of a bark blank would be considerably less than a painted bark and yet the resources to paint barks would be harder to come by in remote areas. Additionally, this policy put the practice of painting barks away from very remote communities. The ability to articulate stories, cultural symbols or other markers of personal or community identity is limited to those in urban areas. So what did the urban-based artists choose to paint? In the beginning, there was very little choice at all. Once in Brisbane, blanks were painted by local Aboriginal people who used templates imported from the Northern Territory. Bruce McLean, the Indigenous curator at the Queensland Gallery of Art, puts the practice in this perspective: the government wanted to sell things from Queensland but they knew things from Arnhem Land sold particularly well. So they sort of manufactured a



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cottage industry of bark paintings and showed the images of Northern Territory designs to people in Brisbane and in Cherbourg and other places as well for them to copy the images.40

One of the artists from this period was Roslyn Serico. Her story is well documented by Michael Aird and his book Brisbane Blacks (2001).41 Serico worked as a government paid artist for over twenty years and began at a very young age with her dad bringing home blank boomerangs to paint (Aird 2001: 94). In Serico’s own words, as recorded by Aird: We were the first black family that was established as the Aboriginal artists for Queensland Aboriginal Creations, which was Native Affairs then. … That was the only shop in the whole of Brisbane that sold Aboriginal artwork. It helped at home; Dad come home with the boomerangs and said, Paint this. We looked at each other and said we would give it a go. (Aird 2001: 94)

Serico talks about painting ‘thousands’ of boomerangs as a family and also touched on the attitude of the government. ‘Like paintings they might say, do 10 this week. I think I got about 10 dollars for them, each. But if you’re looking at doing repetitive work it comes easy’ (Aird 2001: 94). When word got out that as a kid she was making more money than a lot of white families, the government slacked off the amount of orders they gave Serico, but she continued to work for QAC for a long time after (Aird 2001: 94–5). As an adult, Serico was a talented bark painter. Aird writes that Serico’s bark paintings ‘were copied straight from a book of traditional Aboriginal paintings from other regions of Australia’ (Aird 2001: 95). When painting, Serico would follow instructions to paint designs numbered along the bottom of the reprints, just like companies would order them. She recalls:  ‘they were numbered on separate pages; ten number Twenty or five number Threes’ (Aird 2001:  95). Going through the bark paintings being copied, one can identify styles from Oenpelli, Groote Eylandt, Maningrida and Yirrkala. Today, Serico acknowledges that it was wrong but says she was ‘merely following the directions of the government people who employed her’ (Aird 2001:  95). This is an important aspect of the history of QAC and its relations with Aboriginal bark painters. The relationship was not an equal one, but it was one where Aboriginal people were able to engage with a means of gainful employment through methods of cultural production – even if it was somebody else’s culture. The concept of painting somebody else’s culture is anathema to today’s understandings of Aboriginal cultural protocols. It is potentially easy to see

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the situation of importing objects from outside Queensland as another terrible act by the government on First Nations people. The phase of copying works will have significant events for decades to come as this book will demonstrate. However, there is another perspective complicating the bark painting production at QAC. In point of fact, QAC was the only place where Aboriginal and Islander culture – any form of living culture – was on display. QAC was unique in Brisbane because the only other place First Nations people could acquire cultural material knowledge was at the Queensland Museum. This is not to imply that cultural reproduction was only happening in this public sphere, but QAC was the only place First Nations culture was on active and proud display as a living, contemporary mode of expression and not as a relic of past times. Debra Bennett-McLean was also interviewed by Aird and she remembers, as a child, visiting her Auntie Melba who worked at the QAC shop. In her words: I remember the shop really clearly. I remember how small I was when I stood against the counter. I used to think that Auntie Melba was the most fascinating person, bigger than life, she was so gentle and so bright. She had this incredible array of Aboriginal culture around her, which you never saw anywhere else. In those days there was quite a lot of souvenir type of things in the shop. A contemporary interpretation of Aboriginal culture, which was quite different to the types of things that we used to see in the Queensland Museum. (Aird 2001: 94)

Turning back to the mass production aspect of bark paintings and the imported Arnhem Land examples illustrates the kind of copying Serico executed. One of the major purchasers from QAC was a company named Australian Aboriginal Creations, located in Eastwood, New South Wales. Order requests from Australian Aboriginal Creations are plentiful in the files and give some insight into how bark paintings were ordered and thus how they were treated by QAC. One of the best examples comes from an order request from 1 July 1969 and is quite typical of the lot: 4 x large ‘General Initiation’ ‘Milky Way’ ‘Di ewan the Emu and Goomble Gubbon the turkey’ ‘Spearing, cutting up and cooking of a turtle’



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4 x medium ‘Malay Prau’ ‘The Wandjina’ ‘The Legend of the Morning Star’ ‘X-ray Style’ 4 x small ‘X-ray Style’ ‘X-ray Style of warraquk’ ‘Milky Way’ ‘Mythical Kangaroo Man Kandarik’ 4 x extra-small ‘Bubba Peibi’ ‘Legend of the Morning Star’ ‘X-ray Style’ ‘Orion and the Pleiades’42

Bark paintings entitled ‘Milky Way’ and ‘X-ray Style’ were not only available for mass purchase but were in fact available in multiple sizes. This is a telling example of the production line mentality and treatment of Aboriginal art during this time. It is also the basis upon which subsequent issues of cultural copyright come along as ‘The Legend of the Morning Star’ and the ‘Mythical Kangaroo Man Kandarik’ were imported culturally copyrighted stories from Arnhem Land. QAC was first and foremost a business, and a lot of what drove their policies was being successful at selling artworks which had general public appeal. As was asserted in many letters and memo throughout the archives, QAC was the ‘marketing arm’ of the Department of Native Affairs. Peter McMahon – manager in the early 1980s – stated QAC was run ‘on behalf of Queensland Aboriginal and Islander people’.43 In another letter, McMahon writes that ‘in my position as Manager … I am responsible for encouraging Aboriginal people to develop an awareness of and cultural interest in their background and to translate that into an artistic medium’.44 Although these references are from a later date, they seem quite at odds from the way barks were handled during the 1960s and 1970s. Another telling example of this includes the other major item produced by QAC during this time: boomerangs.

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Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art

With boomerangs as well there is a tension at the intersection of commercialization and the desire for an ‘authentic’ item. From the very beginning of the archival record, boomerangs were difficult to produce because of the necessity of finding the appropriate roots from which to make them. Although the production of boomerangs for sale in Brisbane was highly encouraged, it was only supported in limited ways. In a letter from Bleakley to Cherbourg on 23 November 1932, the situation is clearly laid out: With further reference to your memorandum of the 14th advising of the difficulty experienced by natives in securing suitable timber for the purpose of making boomerangs etc., I have to advise that the matter was taken up by this Department … As previously mentioned, it is not the intention to allow natives to incur an additional expense by way of rations etc. to secure materials for curios, but if they feel disposed to collect roots etc. at their leisure and send them down to Brisbane, a ready sale will probably be found for them through the Government Tourist Bureau.45

Officials in Brisbane sat on the curio fence for years before Pascoe opened up the shop in Cherbourg with the idea of mass producing boomerangs. Boomerang blanks were a major industry for communities but as they were made from the roots of certain trees, their shape varied quite a bit. This went against the production line function which QAC thought of these communities as performing. In a letter to Hope Vale on 25 September 1968, the following points were made: We have now received your boomerangs and on checking them, have found them to vary widely in quality and shape. Our locally made boomerangs, because of intense interstate competition, have now reached a high peak of standardization in quality and shape, although the variation in root angles does make this difficult at times. We have selected from your consignment, those boomerangs that meet our local standards and we will pay your prices as asked. We will return to you the substandard boomerangs marked, so that you can understand our comments. … You may think we are harsh on quality and price, but we would only have the substandard boomerangs returned by our clients and as far as price is concerned, your asking prices are in many instances in excess of our Retail prices for decorated boomerangs.46

Learning the prices – what the market could sustain and what communities felt was fair – was part of the development of a curio industry, but throughout the



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records, the shape of the boomerang and its function were always paramount in the discussions. The shape issue is a very interesting one however because throughout the archives, letters to communities stipulate quite heavily how the boomerangs would be made. All curios were to be ‘absolutely authentic’.47 This authenticity was dictated to a large extent by officials in Brisbane. In a memorandum to Woorabinda on 30 July 1937, Bleakley wrote that ‘the boomerangs are to be polished and if possible to be rounded on both sides and not with the flat side according to the sample’.48 That same year, another memo to Cherbourg states, ‘The boomerangs could be made thinner and the edges sharpened in order that if desired they could be used as paper knives.’49 There are also countless examples in the records from the 1960s and through the 1980s of complaints from various boomerang throwing societies about the boomerangs breaking after just a couple of throws, how they did not return ‘properly’ or that their shape was not ‘authentic’. There are records from the Australian Museum on the history of the boomerang and anthropological documents on the traditional usages of the weapon which were sent to QAC as ‘proof ’ of how boomerangs should be produced. And yet with all the talk of authenticity and traditionalism, there would be orders placed quite frequently for 250 boomerangs within a month’s turnaround time. There seemed to be no recognition of the disconnect between the practice of the boomerang production factory and the rhetoric of authenticity. Such was the boomerang production story of QAC. The last major items of production which were rather famous during this time are the pottery studios at Cherbourg and Yarrabah. Objects made include vases, pitchers, mugs, cups and saucers as well as ashtrays and candlesticks. There are no specific details of how these pieces were made, but modern practices include moulds which are fired locally and embellished with designs as artisans see fit. I suspect that this was the same method during these years. The two studios – Cherbourg and Yarrabah – had distinct styles which made them particular to those communities. Cherbourg pottery generally has painted imagery as the main method of decoration. In one example, a pitcher is decorated with a large iguana surrounded by cross-hatched areas of patterning and triangles incised along the top edges. The iguana is stretched across the surface of the piece and includes cross-hatched design elements inside the body as well. Some grooved lines are evident inside the body, but the majority of the decoration is through the painting of designs. Inside the Yarrabah studios, animals were used to decorate the surface and were incised with deeply grooved lines which are painted with a different glaze

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colour than the body of the piece. The interior decoration of the animals, which often included repeated lines and some cross-hatching, might be taken as a form of x-ray style which would have been learned through the painting of barks. Despite the potential influences from the bark painting industry on to the style of the pottery’s subject matter, the fauna are all local to the community: turtles, crocodiles, barramundi, lizards/goannas, dugongs and the occasional kangaroo. The pottery industry for QAC was a more fluid one where content was not as regulated as the bark paintings but there was some made to order aspects as well. Like the other cottage industries, the pottery studios also had their issues. On 7 June 1984, Huggy Bear Beamers ordered birthday carafes from QAC and sent a letter complaining about the quality of the product. It reads in part: The main complaints with the carafes supplied and returned for credit were the lack of uniformity in size, colour, wording and the design of the Koala which in most cases looked like a mouse, one of them even leaked from the bottom. To enhance the complaint, on several of the carafes the word ‘AUSTRALIA’ was spelt incorrectly.50

There were obvious issues with some of the material sent from the communities to Brisbane. The cottage industry system did not always work. It did however have many successes. Decades earlier, Pascoe foresaw the day when the need for ‘everyday household items’ would be met by QAC’s First Nations producers. This was certainly the case with items such as ashtrays and candleholders – the type of Aboriginal kitsch which had become popularized by white producers and purchasers as Roman Black wrote about (1964).

The fine art years: 1987–2000 Around the 1980s, the story of QAC in published accounts is dominated by outrageously imported and copied Arnhem Land barks, scandals of cultural copyright, boomerang factories and the exploitation of Aboriginal culture into sentimental kitsch, ashtrays, candleholders and vases (Kleinert and Neal 2000: 187; Anderson 2001: 119; Demozay 2006: 18). There is actually more to QAC’s story than this and in point of fact, the very best years of QAC were actually just beginning. John Conroy, like J. W. Bleakley decades before, spent a considerable time on Thursday Island and the Cape before heading down to Brisbane to manage the QAC shop in 1987. Conroy travelled all over the Cape, explaining this allowed



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for ‘a bit of cultural experience before coming down [to Brisbane]’.51 Further, Conroy saw ‘huge potential and opportunity for Indigenous communit[ies] to have a retail outlet’. What Conroy did not know of anthropology or art history, he made up for in retail experience and direct contact and experience with remote First Nations life and people. As manager, Conroy saw the failings of past policy choices by QAC and explains what it was like, coming into that environment: in fact, I  can tell you how bad it was. When I  was appointed manager of Aboriginal Creations – in fact I wasn’t appointed, I was just sent there – because I had the retail experience. The interesting thing I really enjoyed was because a lot of southeast Queensland Indigenous people were removed from their culture, and they were being compared to people from Central Australia and Milingimbi who had cultural maintenance and contact over the years. What was happening in Central Australia with the production of dot paintings and the recognition and financial gains, the people here I felt aspired as Indigenous people to use their skills to achieve recognition and income. They wanted to work, but they had been removed from a large degree from cultural contact. Prior to my coming to Aboriginal Creations, that issue was addressed by giving people a copy of Milingimbi works. So I knew enough about those things from working in the Cape so I got all those photos and cut them up and got rid of them. And then Mary Serico who painted hundreds of boomerangs and she had a lovely hand, I said ‘Mary do a painting’. She said to me ‘Cannot’. Now what does she mean ‘cannot’? Is she saying something about ability or seeking permission? So I waited for the right moment, a few weeks later, I had a discrete talk with her. Now what about painting? She said, ‘can I have your permission?’ Now that is the basis for a lot of the problems with people that the government has said you do this now you do that you’ll paint that. So we abolished all that crap and it was open slather. And people were allowed to [paint].52

The conditioning of years of government control in First Nations art production was still evident, even if there were attempts at policy changes. But Conroy did not just have to change QAC from the inside out  – he had to implement changes from the outside in as well. After almost 30 years of entrenchment, the practices of QAC including its existing collection of material and contacts with suppliers were not going to change overnight. Conroy was involved in steps to correct this. For example, aside from ripping up the Arnhem Land book which artists had been copying from for decades, Conroy worked with Aboriginal Arts Management Association Inc., located in New South Wales, in identifying problem works and practices. Conroy’s 24 December 1991 letter reads, in part:

44

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art Your advice is sought in relation to the artwork incorporated in a range of T-shirts, artefacts and paintings offered to Queensland Aboriginal Creations for resale. This approach has been made to you in an effort to eliminate deliberate copying of original designs that belong to various artists in Northern Australia. A sincere effort is being made by Queensland Aboriginal Creations to stop the trade in illegal copies and a number of products that you have previously identified as offensive to Aboriginal Artists have been withdrawn from sale.53

Conroy sent Chris McGuigan of Aboriginal Arts Management photographs of questionable material and McGuigan responded: I have consulted with several Aboriginal artists and arts co-coordinators from the urban, desert and Arnhemland [sic] areas. The general consensus is that all of the work relies far too much on copying the styles and patterns of other Aboriginals artists without the artist contributing to the works any particular creative expression or purpose of his or her own. As they say in the desert ‘nice paint no dreaming’.54

McGuigan then goes through each example and explains why they should no longer be available for sale or circulation. ‘The Wandjina image is prints 8 and 9 should not be used without the written permission of the Western Kimberley people. The bird figures in prints 5 and 6 are taken from the work of Yirrkala artists.’55 These quotes address the copyright of stories – narratives which include places and characters which are regionally and locally specific and where traditional protocols may be in place for their reproduction. Several of these images were included in the archival file, allowing for a comparison of McGuigan notes and the artworks being referenced. In one note, McGuigan is concerned with stylistic copyrights. ‘The desert style painting, print 3 is merely copying a style without any purposes other than to trade off the success of those who own this style. The same can be said for print No. 1.’56 Figure  3 illustrates McGuigan’s point. The colour scheme, the placement of the dots, the concentric circles and the black ‘path’ along the picture plane are all elements of the Central Desert that the general public have learned are the ‘hallmarks’ of the genre. In his letter, McGuigan states that there are ‘many successful urban based Koori and Murri57 artists who are producing work without the need to derive their designs from other successful Aboriginal artists’. He goes on to say that artists in Queensland should use ‘their creative energies to develop their own



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original styles’. McGuigan finishes by writing that he is happy to work with Conroy in correcting this problem and to help educate producers and buyers on ‘Aboriginal law in relation to the use of Aboriginal designs’.58 Feedback to QAC and its artists was not just between white managers and gatekeepers of Aboriginal art. Serico describes her interaction with an Arnhem Land artist, Wandjuk Marika, who had come to Mareeba to visit while Serico was living there. Clarie Grogan told him that I was an artist, and [Wandjuk] said he wanted to meet me. When he came there, and I was doing that sort of work [bark paintings], [Wandjuk said] oh, you can’t do that. I wanted to chuck them paintings out. But he said, they did the wrong things, they shouldn’t have told you to do this. They had no right. He asked me, who told you to paint like this? (Aird 2001: 95)

McGuigan may be correct in his assessment of the Kimberley and Yirrkala figures but it is the issue of style that I would like to pay particular attention. Within the Arnhem Land tradition of bark painting, cross-hatching is not only an expression of an artist’s technical ability but also a reflection of their seniority (Taylor 1996:  238) as well as clan associations and the depictions of country (Morphy 1991:  169). However, the general public’s observations about crosshatching are through a limited understanding of the varied issues at hand. In talking about the issue of cross-hatching, both John Conroy and Richard Bell, an established Aboriginal artist and activist, say that it was – in reality – never the style of artwork which was a problem for artists from the Northern Territory but just the stories which were held to be sacred. Bell recalls a time when an artist from Yirrkala came down to Brisbane to have medical treatment. The artist stayed with a local anthropologist and spent time at QAC, painting for some extra money. As Bell describes, the styles of the bark paintings Queensland artists copied were never really an issue. Those fellows back then, [they told us] you can use cross-hatching and dots, you just can’t use our stories. That’s basically what we sorted out. What they said. Till this day, if a blackfellas not from the desert wants to paint with cross-hatching or dots, they are told by the curators that they can’t do that because it’s derivative. Yet all of Western Art is derivative! 59

Bell describes the crux of the problem for Queensland artists during these times and even through until today. Marshall Bell, a Gamilaroi artist practicing in Brisbane and Richard Bell’s brother, has extensively researched local designs and motifs using archival records and photographs showcasing tree carvings and

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possum skin cloak designs of southeast Queensland (2010). In his writings, Bell builds up a local southeast Queensland Aboriginal art history particularly in response to what Richard describes above. The bark painting policy of QAC had left its mark on local artists who now have to defend the practice of dotting and cross-hatching when in reality, the problem has always been one of culturally copyrighted stories. Although McGuigan refers to the designs on the barks as the main problem, both Richard and Marshall Bell argue for understandings of the issue which go beyond surface appearances. This debate around the ownership of a dot or cross-hatch design still rages on today. Rosyln Serico talks about other changes Conroy was trying to implement at QAC. She talks about how Conroy did away with the number system and encouraged Aboriginal artists to paint their own material. John Conroy made us paint for ourselves. Before he came in that’s when all the big noise came about that Queensland artists were copying [Northern] Territory art. John Conroy was the one who said, I am sending you some barks, paint me something. No more of this number Twenty. I want you to do something yourself. So I got about it like I would like to paint a kangaroo and I do a kangaroo and it sold and that encouraged me. John was very good, he is the main person that encouraged black artists in Brisbane and worked through QAC to do their own thing. (Aird 2001: 95)

As this quote shows, bark paintings had become a large part of the tradition of art practice in Queensland and were not going to go away. As Bruce McLean observes: I believe that when John went out [to the artists], he tried to get people to stop doing that [copying] and to do their own style of painting – still do the bark paintings because that was what the government wanted them to do. So still doing bark paintings but at that time the Hope Vale bark paintings started to emerge as well – [they were] based on the rock paintings based around Hope Vale and the caves there rather than the Northern Territory designs.60

Aside from scrapping the tradition of copying, instead of making attempts to get artists to paint for themselves, Conroy also opened up a gallery for the first time in QAC’s history. Conroy describes how he had to obtain the space for the gallery. Next to QAC there was an archival store. I  tried on many occasions to get that space as a gallery. The opportunity came when Colleen Wall and Shirley



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McNamara came down from Mt Isa – about 7 or 8 Indigenous ladies finishing up an arts course and they had to have an exhibition. They’d come in to see me and asked if I could do an exhibition. And I said yes I could do an exhibition with no idea what I was going to do. You go back and do your 40 or 50 paintings, start putting names together and then get somebody to open it. You open it [the ladies said]. Oh no, you want somebody who’s pretty well known. The teacher [they answered]. No bigger. And then eventually they said, what about the Premier and I said yes! Good idea! Write a letter to the Premier. And they wrote directly to the Premier and he said I’d love to open your exhibition. And I said give me a copy of that letter. So I went up to the Administration of the Queensland government who would not let me have access to the archival store and I said ‘get all that shit out of that storeroom, the Premier’s coming and I gotta hang paintings on the walls’. So in 3 weeks, the archival store was emptied and there you go.61

The gallery space was important in Brisbane for Aboriginal and Islander artists. It was a professional space for artists to display their work but one relaxed enough to be obtainable. Bruce McLean commented that a lot of the early Torres Strait Islander print work as well as that of Lockhart River artists and other northern Queensland artists was displayed for the first time there. The TAFE studios from Cairns would hold occasional shows there as well which will be discussed more in Chapter 3. In talking with people who had first-hand knowledge of QAC – people like Michael Aird, Bruce McLean, John Conroy and Richard Bell – it is clear that there is another aspect of the shop which its sensationalized history has tended to gloss over. There was in fact a community art centre aspect to QAC which, despite its government mandate and entrenched arts practices, was very much a reality. Since the 1970s, QAC had in place a form of profit sharing whereby end of year profits were divided among participating artists. During Conroy’s time, the end of year bonus coincided with a massive Christmas party. Conroy kept a record of people and artists and buyers who attended their gallery openings and would invite everybody on the list to the shop. Richard Bell remembers those events as fun, social times where the entire Aboriginal community would gather and celebrate. With regard to purchasing artworks, QAC had an open door policy where any First Nations artist could submit work for sale or consignment. Conroy had a fixed budget and would have to buy works not only from Brisbane artists who would come to the shop but from the communities who would submit works as well. Sometimes, local artists would not be able to get paid for their works

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because funds had already been allocated to communities. This of course caused tension between local artists and Conroy but as Bell describes, this was because most local artists believed QAC was theirs and set up for their benefit. Indeed, there was a lot of benefit QAC provided for local Aboriginal people. Laughing, Bell describes the situation as follows: ‘put it this way: if somebody had a big electricity bill, they’d do a big mob of boomerangs and take it down there and get Conroy to fucking buy it!’62 Conroy agrees with Bell, describing the role of QAC in this way: It was a meeting place for the community. It was a meeting place where they could get support for a little bit of effort. If you go into another government agency for support for money or loans – there’s a whole process. But you could bring in something there and get a check. Or cash.63

Conversations with Michael Aird also put the QAC legacy into a bit of perspective. He saw the works coming out of the communities as innovative and inspiring, especially the shadowboxes out of Cherbourg. Aird makes the point that despite the controversies surrounding copyright issues, the amount of industry and care First Nations producers put into their efforts was not something to be ignored. According to Aird, the entire Serico family in fact were able to live a comfortable life out of producing boomerangs alone. There is a family sense of pride as well as a particular style that has been passed down even today. Returning to the shadowboxes, these artefacts were crafted by Cherbourg artists for the market and are an amazingly creative use of boomerang shapes (Figure 4 but also seen hanging on the wall of Figure  1). Jack O’Chin  – although not the only artist working in this tradition – made the shadowboxes popular and perfected their form. Shadowboxes represent something new and innovative and more research needs to be done into these objects in order to give them the recognition they deserve. Numerous types of Aboriginal artefacts came out of QAC’s engagement with communities and families which were not simply government products but Aboriginal-owned and -imagined creations. As Butler writes, the beginnings of QAC and the interest the Department of Aboriginal Affairs had in curio production were based on a ‘concern for the preservation and perpetuation of traditional First Nations culture in Queensland, however the problem was that there was no clear idea of what represented Queensland traditional culture at the time’ (2003: 196). There is much conflict in the later years of QAC as communities and government departments debated, experimented, advocated and searched for ‘Queensland Indigenous art’. In the



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archives is a scathing letter from Richard Bell to John Conroy demanding that all non-Queensland artwork be removed and that more preference for local artists be made.64 There are rumours of poor business practices by subsequent managers and issues of nepotism as First Nations managers took the lead after Conroy left. The legacy of QAC is a complex one and should be treated as such – not simply vilified. In talking with McLean about the legacy of QAC, the curator sums the situation nicely. I’m not sure to be honest. It’s an interesting [issue]. [QAC] has an interesting position because it was sort of a place for people to send art and artefacts to before anywhere else was interested. It sort of kept people involved in making those things for a long time. Things like weaving, the Yarrabah pottery especially – a lot of that work was sold to QAC. And unfortunately, now they don’t really do much of that pottery anymore. That sort of Hope Vale industry as well. And a lot of important works or works from important periods in Queensland’s history came through QAC because there wasn’t an alternative route. So mainstream galleries weren’t interested in showing works by Aboriginal artists and the only avenue was through the tourist shops which would have been a much harder way for Aboriginal producers to deal with. So it held a unique position in that respect. But also the practices of manufacturing art and producing styles of art which were not local. It seemed to be an interesting approach where particularly local artists were expected to supply for the tourist industry and really that where QAC [was] making its money. It had to be making money to continue. And then a lot of artists from communities where just able to concentrate on making objects and artworks which didn’t have the same sort of stigma attached. It also provided an outlet for a lot of artists firstly to engage with the industry and so I  guess Richard [Bell] started selling a lot of his paintings from there and then went on to Fireworks and Campfire. And Ron Hurley often sold his works there and then going all the way back to Joe Rootsey who did painting lessons there when he was in Brisbane and things like that.65

It is in this light that QAC should be remembered. Like McLean states, QAC facilitated important voices in Brisbane such as those of Ron Hurley, who has been described as ‘one of the earliest, and certainly one of the strongest, voices’ in the Aboriginal art community (Queensland Art Gallery 2009: 5), and Joe Rootsey, who was described as ‘Queensland’s Namatjira’ (Queensland Art Gallery 2010: 20). Because most writings about QAC have put the institution in a negative position, a lot of what was good has been missed out. In that negativity, a lot of the creativity and agency of Aboriginal people has been ignored.

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Government participation in First Nations material culture was facilitated by the belief that economic prosperity could be achieved through the exploitation of artefacts sold to tourists. This philosophy led to the deliberate creation of a First Nations arts industry in Queensland. This creation facilitated cottage industries across the State including boomerang factories in Cherbourg, pottery studios in Yarrabah, shell collecting and weaving in the Torres Strait and painting barks and boomerangs in Brisbane. Because of the success and popularity of artefacts from the Northern Territory – as well as seeing their own First Nations population as ‘lacking’ in culture  – bark paintings were imported into Queensland from the Northern Territory for copying by local artisans for mass production and sale. This practice created several issues surrounding cultural copyright and tensions in representation which went well beyond the QAC years. This history left large cultural scars on contemporary First Nations artists as they continue to grapple with what they want to paint and what the perceived expectations of the audience are and what is actually painted and/or produced. The legacy of QAC is manifold as McLean makes clear – there are aspects which can be viewed as having both positive and negative effects. There is no doubt that importing of out of state cultural material and artistic styles has contributed to the tension in representation found in Queensland today. Marshall Bell’s essays grapple with these issues and indeed, he feels that he has to address these issues which prevent Queensland artists from expressing themselves as they want to. QAC continued to operate well into the 2000s and when John Conroy left as manager in the early 1990s, the shop went to First Nations management with the artist Ron Hurley as the first Aboriginal manager of QAC. The story of QAC changes during this time and is less germane to the issues at hand and so will be left for another time. Since QAC was involved in the development of the TAFE First Nations arts curriculum, I  will return to how First Nations communities reacted to this issue of cultural copyright in the 1980s in the next chapter.

Notes 1 This is the historical title used in Queensland during this time and technically also included Torres Strait Islanders. Today, ‘Aborigines’ is considered by many First Nations peoples as no longer appropriate. Some even find it offensive. The preferred terms today are ‘Aboriginal peoples’ or specific tribal affiliations (e.g. Yidinji, Noongar, pakana).



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2 Queensland State Archives Item ID336275, Correspondence, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander. Further details: Curios 1179/1933–4442/1933, summary of multiple letters of correspondence. 3 Ibid. 4 Queensland State Archives Item ID336275, Correspondence, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander. Further details: Queensland Tourist Bureau’s itemized inventory sheet, September 1933. 5 Queensland State Archives Item ID336275, Correspondence, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander. Further details: 19 December 1933 memorandum from J. W. Bleakley to the Protector Thursday Island. 6 Queensland State Archives Item ID336275, Correspondence, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander. Further details: 27 April 1933 letter from J. W. Bleakley to Cherbourg settlement. 7 Queensland State Archives Item ID336275, Correspondence, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander. Further details: 27 April 1933 letter from J. W. Bleakley to Cherbourg’s superintendent. 8 Queensland State Archives Item ID336275, Correspondence, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander. Further details: 6 June 1933 letter from J. W. Bleakley to Palm Island’s superintendent. 9 Queensland State Archives Item ID336666 and Item ID336929, Correspondence, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander. Further details: summary of multiple letters of correspondence across both files. See particularly a letter from the Mexican Consul for ‘certain Australian novelties suitable for gift purposes’ dated 5 April 1939. 10 Queensland State Archives Item ID336275, Correspondence, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander. Further details: September 1933 letter from J. W. Bleakley to Yarrabah’s superintendent. 11 Queensland State Archives Item ID336275, Correspondence, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander. Further details: summary of multiple letters of correspondence. 12 Queensland State Archives Item ID336277, Correspondence, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander. Further details: record has several examples of correspondences between the Chief Protector and communities outlining the process of sale and reimbursement and the tracking of individuals. 13 Queensland State Archives Item ID336275, Correspondence, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander. Further details: 27 October 1933 memorandum from the Deputy Chief Protector of Aboriginals to Cherbourg’s superintendent. 14 Today, museums selling mass-produced items in their gallery stores are moving towards naming the artist and away from works without producer names. The National Museum of Australia in Canberra is a good example of this emerging practice.

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15 Queensland State Archives Item ID336276, Correspondence, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander. Further details: 29 September 1933 letter from the captain of the Ulysses to the chief protector. 16 Queensland State Archives Item ID336276, Correspondence, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander. Further details: 24 March 1933 letter from the captain of the Manunda to the chief protector. 17 Queensland State Archives Item ID336661, Correspondence, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander. Further details: 28 June 1935 Telegraph newspaper article. 18 Queensland State Archives Item ID336661, Correspondence, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander. Further details: 14 August 1935 Telegraph newspaper article. 19 Queensland State Archives Item ID336280, Correspondence, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander. Further details: undated schedule of items for display at the Brisbane exhibition. 20 Queensland State Archives Item ID336661, Correspondence, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander. Further details: 28 June 1935 Telegraph newspaper article. 21 Queensland State Archives Item ID336661, Correspondence, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander. Further details: 9 July 1935 memorandum from the deputy chief protector to the Government Printer, Brisbane. 22 Queensland State Archives Item ID336661, Correspondence, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander. Further details: 24 August 1935 newspaper article from The Telegraph. 23 Queensland State Archives Item ID502315, Correspondence, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander. Further details: 17 August 1935 newspaper article from The Telegraph. 24 Babcock is citing O. S. Halseth (1925) ‘The Acculturation of the Pueblo’. El Palacio 18:12, 263–4. 25 Queensland State Archives Item ID502314, Correspondence, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander. Further details: 19 December 1959 report from H. R. Pascoe to the chief protector. 26 Queensland State Archives Item ID502314, Correspondence, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander. Further details: 15 January 1959 report from H. R. Pascoe to the chief protector. 27 Queensland State Archives Item ID502314, Correspondence, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander. Further details: 9 February 1959 letter from the director of Native Affairs to the undersecretary. 28 Queensland State Archives Item ID502314, Correspondence, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander. Further details: 20 March 1959 letter from H. R. Pascoe to the chief protector. 29 Queensland State Archives Item ID502314, Correspondence, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander. Further details: 28 November 1958 newsletter published by the Public Relations Bureau, Brisbane.



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30 Queensland State Archives Item ID502314, Correspondence, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander. Further details: 1 December 1958 memorandum from H. R. Pascoe to the chief protector. 31 Queensland State Archives Item ID502314, Correspondence, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander. Further details: 28 September 1959 memorandum from H. R. Pascoe to the Department of Native Affairs. 32 Queensland State Archives Item ID502314, Correspondence, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander. Further details: 2 September 1959 memorandum for the files. 33 Queensland State Archives Item ID502314, Correspondence, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander. Further details: 30 July 1959 letter to the director, QAC. 34 Queensland State Archives Item ID502314, Correspondence, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander. 35 Queensland State Archives Item ID502315, Correspondence, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander. Further details: 31 August 1960 letter from Currumbin Tea Gardens to Queensland Aboriginal Creations. 36 The records do little to illuminate why there was a restructuring. Further research needs to be done to see if there was any political or economic reason for such a move. 37 Queensland State Archives Item ID504819, Correspondence, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander. Further details: 26 April 1967 letter from A. V. Istead (director of QAC) to the director, Aboriginal and Islander Affairs. 38 Queensland State Archives Item ID646454, Correspondence, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander. Further details: 19 March 1986 order form from Arnhem Art to QAC. 39 Queensland State Archives Item ID646444, Correspondence, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander. Further details: 5 March 1968 letter from I. V. Istead to the Hope Vale manager. 40 Personal communication, 1 September 2011. 41 Aird’s publication has several photos which illustrate this period and is well worth exploring for further context. 42 Queensland State Archives Item ID504813, Correspondence, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander. Further details: 1 July 1969 invoice from Australian Aboriginal Creations to QAC. 43 Queensland State Archives Item ID511249, Correspondence, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander. Further details: for one of many examples, see 16 August 1983 letter from Peter McMahon to Sir Sydney Williams, OBE. 44 Queensland State Archives Item ID511249, Correspondence, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander. Further details: 20 June 1983 letter from QAC to Australia Council. 45 Queensland State Archives Item ID336275, Correspondence, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander. Further details: 23 November 1932 letter from J. W. Bleakley to Cherbourg superintendent.

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46 Queensland State Archives Item ID646444, Correspondence, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander. Further details: 25 September 1968 letter from QAC to Hope Vale superintendent. 47 Queensland State Archives Item ID502316, Correspondence, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander. Further details: 20 September 1961 letter from J. W. Bleakley to A. W. C. de Witte, manager at Karumba Lodge. 48 Queensland State Archives Item ID336663, Correspondence, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander. Further details: 30 July 1937 letter from J. W. Bleakley to Woorabinda superintendent. 49 Queensland State Archives Item ID336663, Correspondence, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander. Further details: 30 July 1937 letter from J. W. Bleakley to Cherbourg superintendent. 50 Queensland State Archives Item ID646417, Correspondence, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander. Further details: 7 June 1984 letter from Huggy Bear Beamers to QAC. 51 Personal communication, 11 October 2011. 52 Ibid. 53 Queensland State Archives Item ID646421, Correspondence, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander. Further details: 24 December 1991 letter from John Conroy to Aboriginal Arts Management Association, Inc. 54 Queensland State Archives Item ID646421, Correspondence, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander. Further details: 22 January 1992 letter from Aboriginal Arts Management Association, Inc. to John Conroy/QAC. 55 Queensland State Archives Item ID646421, Correspondence, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander. Further details: 22 January 1992 letter from Aboriginal Arts Management Association, Inc. to John Conroy/QAC. 56 Queensland State Archives Item ID646421, Correspondence, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander. Further details: 22 January 1992 letter from Aboriginal Arts Management Association, Inc. to John Conroy/QAC. 57 Koori and Murri are colloquial terms for a collective Aboriginal identity. Koori are those Aboriginal people in southern states such as New South Wales and Victoria. Murri are those Aboriginal people across the entire state of Queensland. 58 Queensland State Archives Item ID646421, Correspondence, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander. Further details: 22 January 1992 letter from Aboriginal Arts Management Association, Inc. to John Conroy/QAC. 59 Personal communication, 1 September 2011. 60 Personal communication, 11 October 2011. 61 Personal communication, 1 September 2011. 62 Ibid. 63 Ibid.



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64 Queensland State Archives Item ID646421, Correspondence, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander. Further details: 6 December 1991 letter from Richard Bell to Les Malezer/Department of Family Services and Aboriginal Affairs, Brisbane, Queensland. 65 Personal communication, 1 September 2011.

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3

The history of the studio

The 1980s changed a lot of things for First Nations Australians and was marked by a large amount of activism surrounding the 1988 bicentennial celebrations of the arrival of British citizens to Australia.1 As already demonstrated in Chapter 2, QAC also went through many changes to try and correct decades of misguided art policies. The TAFE arts programme was born during this period. The TAFE programme in Cairns can be viewed as one of the many processes where First Nations production of artefacts turned into the production of fine art. This process however would take several years after the programme’s inception. This chapter explores that process of change. On 15 May 1988, John Conroy of QAC was well aware of the TAFE programme and wrote about it in his correspondences to the Welfare Services Branch of the Queensland government. I have been aware for some time of the quality of the work produced by the Cairns T.A.F.E [sic] students. The students, at the invitation of Department of Community Services, have sold items at the Cape York Dance Festival. Since undertaking my position at Queensland Aboriginal Creations, I have been in contact with T.A.F.E., Brisbane regarding the availability of artefacts produced by the graduates of the Cairns College. I intend to persue [sic] this matter further and perhaps seek approval to visit Cairns to make personal contacts. Undoubtedly the items produced by T.A.F.E.  students are very saleable and would fulfil an urgent need to extend the Queensland Aboriginal Creation’s range with quality merchandise.2

No really definitive history of the Tropical North Queensland Institute of TAFE’s (TNQTAFE) First Nations arts programme exists, despite the fact that the programme was the first and for the longest time the only programme of its kind. The most complete attempt at writing a history is Avril Quail’s short essay

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in the Queensland Art Gallery’s Story Place exhibition catalogue (2003). There are short articles exploring personal accounts of the programme and numerous publications with a descriptive paragraph or two (Edmund 1990; Kleinert and Neal 2000; Anderson 2001; Demozay 2006; Robinson 2006) but no real critical research into how the programme began and why. This may not seem the greatest of oversights but in reality, the misunderstood beginnings of the TAFE programme in fact created a ripple effect of unintended negative outcomes for the pioneering First Nations people initially involved. A host of problems for contemporary students that emerged during the field period were related to people not ‘knowing the history’ of the studio. The biggest misunderstanding lay in the misconception of the TAFE First Nations studio as a mainstream invention. This misunderstanding has made the original students feel diminished and slighted. Articles on the TAFE programme do not delve back far enough and lack an understanding of how the first wave of students conceived the courses. Many of the articles in fact contradict each other. The first part of this chapter looks at the published views on how the TAFE programme was initiated and places its beginnings in a wider historical context. The second part of this chapter explores how the cultural content of the studio was created and envisioned by the students, staff and administration. This section also looks at the development of the arts curriculum and the emergence of a strong focus on culture. These accounts will be the basis of understanding for the rest of the book as the conflicts and troubles experienced by contemporary students is in part laid out, as well as forgotten, in this early history. Overall, the conflicting identities of the TAFE arts programme – as a skills training exercise or as a place for personal development or as a space for cultural renewal – are at the heart of these tensions. The Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander (ATSI) arts course in Cairns began in 1984 during a particular period in Australian history. As Brian Robinson notes in his introduction to the Unreal Shields: Revisiting Kingplates – Creating Etchings with Attitude catalogue, the programme was established during ‘a growth period in Australia Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander education that witnessed the first wave of indigenous [sic]3 graduates from university and tertiary courses. Art schools began to enrol indigenous [sic] students in all disciplines at a prodigious rate and courses evolved to cater for them’ (2006: 9). Fighting a structure which favoured Western methods of artistic learning, the first successful wave of First Nations artists began to call for a pedagogy which was designed for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander students and their needs. As Robinson notes:



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What followed was an increase in funding for on-campus indigenous [sic] study centres and focusing on indigenous [sic] participation. The Eora TAFE Arts Centre and Tranby College merged in Sydney. The Jabal Centre, Australian National University in Canberra and others followed. Batchelor College in Darwin expanded into arts and crafts at the same time TNQTAFE actively developed and promoted the first designated indigenous [sic] visual arts course in Far North Queensland. (2006: 9)

Such summaries are succinct and accurate but there is much more to understand and write about regarding the beginnings of the TAFE programme. Through an examination of the archival records, it is clear there was already an array of courses being offered to First Nations people across the region. These courses were ultimately seen as not fulfilling the needs of local First Nations people in Cairns but they provide a glimpse into the foundation upon which the current programme is based. Technical education in Australia began in 1833 in New South Wales as an offshoot of Britain’s mechanics’ institutes and schools of arts (Stevenson 1989:  133). Before that, education in Australia was ‘first represented by the apprenticeship system, which had become prominent in the 1800s because of a need to train unskilled convicts for a life in a new society’ (Training and Further Education NSW 2010 [online]). Initially, these courses were only for the ‘middle and upper classes of the Colony’ and were based on ‘the growing belief that the values of self-improvement and moral enlightenment were fostered by relevant study’ (Stevenson 1989:  133). Going through the early history of technical training in Australia, there are two key aspects which have been present since day one and are relevant to this research: the existence of arts courses and the focus on jobs training. Organized arts courses in New South Wales began in 1848 with a ‘series of mechanical drawing class’ (Stevenson 1989: 133). Coincidentally, the first TAFE course in Queensland, held in 1882, was also a mechanical drawing class (Tropical North Queensland Institute of TAFE 2012 [online]). The TAFE NSW website states that ‘even from the early days the deliverers of technical education in NSW took the view that education should not only strengthen job prospects – it should enrich society’ (TAFE NSW 2010 [online]). This statement does not address the earlier apprenticeship programmes which existed to provide a technically adept labour force. However, this demonstrates the fluctuation of identities the TAFE system had from its inception:  is it a technical school for job skills or a recreational space for following individual pursuits? Too easily, the answer to this question is ‘both’ but importantly, the

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question of what course falls where is a key consideration. Some courses can be clearly classified as job skill development, such as engineering, plumbing, aquaculture, marine engine driving and construction. Other courses can be both skills and personal development, such as hairdressing or automotive, but others are more on the level of personal development such as ceramics or painting.

TAFE programmes in the early 1980s In 1983, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander courses came through the ‘Officerin-Charge Aboriginal and Islander TAFE services’ and the director of the Department of Aboriginal and Islander Advancement.4 Around the time of the beginning of the ATSI arts studio, there were several different kinds of courses which were being done remotely through the TAFE system and targeted at Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander populations. These courses illustrate how the TAFE was engaged with First Nations training long before the creation of the ATSI studio and represent a survey of courses offered from 1980 to 1984 through the Department of Aboriginal and Islander Advancement. These courses also shed light on the types of courses which were delivered. There are basically three different types of courses which focused on ATSI communities: personal development, skills in manual labour and skills in a cottage industry. These three types of courses will be discussed along with examples of how they were supposed to be implemented. The wording of these courses tells a story about how the courses were to be used by the people taking them and what the outcome expectations the administration had of these programmes. The first set of courses to be examined could potentially be labelled as ‘personal development’. Some courses did not have a direct economic outcome but were rather based on elements of education which could be translated into indirect economic benefits  – hence personal development. These types of courses include classes on deportment (Thursday Island), dress making (Thursday Island), cooking and literacy on Saibai and Boigu Islands, and basic home maintenance (Weipa). Some of these classes were quite well intentioned towards issues of cultural importance and included attempts to help maintain languages. For example, the cooking and literacy course to be held on the Torres Strait was to be held in language. The course description reads as follows: Cooking & Literacy (Saibai, Boigu) – outline: this combined class is designed to teach cooking and literacy skills cuminating [sic] with the production of a cooking book in a western Island language. It is hoped that the desire to learn



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how to read in write in Kala Lagaw Ya will be increased with the practical application of language skills.5

This is a really unique case where a course was designed to accommodate another language and showed some progressive thought about First Nations learning and pedagogy in the early 1980s. The focus on cooking skills and developing a cookbook in language shows a level of cultural accommodation which was previously unconsidered in Queensland. This course seems to be a unique one as subsequent courses did not allow for as much cultural consideration. Skills in manual labour reflected life in remote Australia and offered the skills for employment on cattle stations and fishing industries. Yard construction (Aurukun) courses taught the skills for erecting horse and cattle yards; marine maintenance (Thursday Island) taught the operation and upkeep of outboard motors; and there was even a course on oxy-fuel and arc welding (Kowanyama).6 There was also part-time hairdressing at Yarrabah, sewing and macramé in Mareeba, basic woodworking in Babinda, car body painting in Kuranda, pineapple growing in Woompera-Muralug and auto mechanics throughout the Cape and Torres Strait. These programmes were targeted at First Nations people to help improve their employment opportunities. Some courses – such as dress making on Thursday Island – were delivered inside the high school. It is unknown if only First Nations students ever participated in these courses or if they were open to everyone who might be interested. These courses however were put on by the Department of Aboriginal and Islander Advancement and so, supposedly, only open to Aboriginal and Islander students. Cottage industries are ones where the production of goods is done on a small scale and usually created in a home rather than mass-produced in a factory. QAC was involved in many such cottage industries and was pivotal in setting them up. TAFE was also involved in encouraging cottage industries around the Cairns region. Cottage industries through the TAFE were marketed in ways which encouraged cultural reproduction as well as participation in the market. For example, the course on pandanus weaving is described as follows: Pandanus Craft Workshop (Cairns) – outline: The course will teach traditional Aboriginal string work & will cover selection of material methods of making string & simple knot work. The aim of the course is to demonstrate the skills required for this type of craft & to encourage others to learn traditional Aboriginal craft work. The skills learnt can be used as a leisure time activity or producing craft work for the tourist industry. Tutor: Koppa Yunkaporta7

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This course is typical in that it combines a desire for learning ‘traditional’ craft work as well as promoting the potential for selling. The focus is on the tourist industry which is an important industry in Cairns for any artist wanting to earn a living through their craft and/or art production. This course had a First Nations instructor which was not always the case, but TAFE did seem to make an effort to hire Aboriginal or Islander instructors when they could. Enoch Tranby, a local Aboriginal artist, was the instructor for many of the Aboriginal artefact courses. The Aboriginal artist Thancoupie (Gloria Fletcher) was also employed to teach pottery courses ‘using local clay and materials’ and the ‘aim is to set up a pottery industry for eventual sale of pottery.’8 All of these are examples where the goal is not just teaching a skill, but teaching a marketable skill – a skill which would return income to the student in some way or another based on the cultural values TAFE saw potential students as having. Not all cottage industry-type courses had a cultural content or an expressly written cultural content. The leatherwork course was geared to ‘teach students the knowledge and art of this craft and develop creative items from leather … [such as] wallets, key rings, stubby coolers, baskets, jewel cases, etc.’ Some courses were very obvious in their aims such as one entitled ‘Cottage Industry Knitting and Crocheting’ where the goal of the course was to learn how to read patterns and have basic skills at creating jumpers for hangers and tea cosies. These were the items – along with Aboriginal artefacts, woven works and pottery – TAFE viewed as marketable and appropriate for sale in the local region. What these First Nations arts courses show is the focus TAFE had on arts and crafts programmes as ways to improve economic outcomes for people. This is a continuation of the philosophies and attitudes of the state government that produced QAC as described in Chapter 2. Additionally, these examples establish a focus on connecting culture with the courses TAFE offered long before the First Nations arts programme began in 1984. The records show that there is enough of a variety and spread across the entire Cape York region to indicate a high level of interest on the TAFE’s part to offer courses which were both culturally relevant and economically oriented to First Nations interests.

How the course began The courses which have been described were the ones around which the current First Nations arts programme began. Early TAFE offerings to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people of the Cairns region focused on a particular type of



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First Nations cottage industry – these were not fine arts courses. There was one instructor who was doing some works with fabrics. His name was Tom Vudrag and he was a textile instructor who taught courses through the TAFE. Although silkscreening and batik are art forms which lend themselves to fine art, the focus of the course was still on the market with one course stipulating a development of ‘techniques for mass production’.9 The philosophy of the Textile Cottage Industry course – the reason behind the course – is key in understanding how it was executed and understood by both the instructors and the students. This emphasis was on producing works for sale, for catering to the strong tourist market available in Cairns and through programmes which were short term or one-offs. There was a huge gap in the TAFE curriculum for Aboriginal and Islander artists, and both instructors and students believed more could be done to involve people in the arts. How and why did the TAFE First Nations arts programme begin? Most accounts agree that the first students and studies commenced in 1984 (Edmund 1990; Eglitis 1990; Hollingsworth 1993; Eglitis 2000). Aside from Robinson’s brief article on First Nations education across Australia, the most frequently quoted account of the TAFE’s beginnings is the one written by Mabel Edmund, A. M. She writes: While teaching his students Tom discovered a wish among them to break away from the basic drawing and painting and explore batik and screenprinting. He felt that enough opportunities did not exist for black Australians and that white Australian society was smothering the advancement of the world’s oldest artistic heritage. In Tom’s own words he says he began to push for what he considered to be an [absolute] necessity and that was a senior-level School of Fine Arts exclusive for Aborigines. (Edmund 1990: 109)

Edmund’s article is an often quoted piece when authors are referencing the beginnings of the TAFE programme. She mentions the dedication of the early students and the role later instructors, especially Anna Eglitis, would play in shaping the success and direction of the course. Curiously, despite this article being well-known and quoted in most publications, Anna Eglitis was credited with both creating and initiating the course. Published accounts mentioning the TAFE course often cite Eglitis as the key component of the programme’s success. In Gelam Nguzu Kazi  – Dugong My Son, the title of both the catalogue and exhibition of Torres Strait prints from the Mualgau Minaral Artist Collective on Moa Island, Adrian Newstead writes in the introduction about the new vision

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of culture arising from artists attending TAFEs across Queensland (2001). In particular, he wrote about the Cairns TAFE as follows: The most notable of these was the course started by Anna Eglitis at the Cairns TAFE college and the printmaking facilities that have grown out of it. The influence of these graduates has spawned a vibrant new art movement in much the same way that Jeff Bardon’s art classes in the central desert community of Papunya did in the early 1970s. The difference being that Bardon worked with old men and Eglitis taught and stimulated a younger generation. (Newstead 2001: 8)

Geoff Dixon wrote in his introductory essay to the On the Edge exhibition catalogue how Anna Eglitis was ‘deeply committed to initiating the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander (ATSI) Visual Arts course at the Cairns Institute of TAFE’ (Dixon 2008: unpaginated). Indeed, in most publications which mention the ATSI arts course, Anna Eglitis’s name is closely associated and credited with the success of the course. In point of fact, although Anna was and still is committed to the course’s continued success and survival, she did not initiate nor start the course. The course was started on the desire and drive of Aboriginal and Islander people with the aid of Tom Vudrag. Jenny Martens is one of the original students of the course from 1984. I met her when I was helping current TAFE students at an outdoor market in 2010. She came up to the stall and said, ‘We started the course. We did. You need to know that.’ I was unable to get her contact details then but I met her again later on in the year. It was at the Banggu Minjaany Gallery on the TAFE campus and the non-Indigenous instructor at the time had just opened the exhibition in ripped blue jeans and a faded t-shirt. Jenny was livid and, in front of the entire assembly, told him how ashamed he should be treating the opening with such disrespect, especially after she and the other students had fought so hard to create the programme. I followed her out of the gallery and asked if she would mind telling me her story. During the interview, she told me how she saw the beginnings of the TAFE programme. there was nothing for Indigenous people, you know, here. When I say Indigenous people, I mean house wives and people who just had a lot of time on their hands. And Tom [Vudrag], he was a Baha’i-a. Tom also had a little bit of knowledge of art and screenprinting from where he came from. … He had a lot of background in screenprinting and things like that so he got together with us and said he’d, well to me, he said he’d like to get together and do something for us.10



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Jenny went on further to describe the personal connection between her and Tom as well as how funding for the course came to be available. My husband was in the Baha’i church and that’s how we got to know Tom and his family. I know Tom’s wife … Yeah so I knew him socially and that’s where Tom said he’d like to do something with Indigenous people and would I like to talk with to others about it. About that time, Betty, Jane and I were setting up a woman’s shelter. So it sort of grew from there. And there was the education department – DEET – they were given money for tutors to teach and we were getting – the students were getting – a small amount of money. So that’s how we started.11

The shelter Jenny is referring to was a building operated by Shirley and Lillian Christian who wanted a place where First Nations women could go and sell artworks and crafts to tourists. It was an initiative that Jenny was already involved in and Tom’s interest in further arts training slotted into the existing concept already conceived of by First Nations women in Cairns. This is the beginning that the first students remember and which is practically erased from official, published accounts. Elaine Lampton was one of the first to be recruited by this initial wave of students. Elaine remembers these events as Jenny relates them but Elaine continued on in the school long past gaining her certificates. Elaine was the lead instructor when I  started my fieldwork in 2010 and was eager for me to understand the history of the ATSI arts programme. Elaine talks about the beginnings of the TAFE programme in reference to the women’s shelter as well. We started that school. We were the first art school at TAFE. Blackfellas started that. We didn’t ask whitefellas to help us until we got it going and then we got the white teachers in. … There was Shirley Christian, Lillian Christian, Tina Klaus, Ursula Morgan and Ursula’s father. He had an Aboriginal shop here. What happened was we wanted to learn about doing batiks with Aboriginal imagery on it so we could sell it for market and make some money from the marketplace and home industry. It had nothing to do with all the theory stuff. We just wanted to do all the practical stuff to get it out into the markets. Learn at the TAFE but go home and do home wares for the market.12

Some of the key things to note in Elaine’s telling are the emphasis on the relationship between the studio and TAFE. The remarks on theory foreshadow what I  would come to understand as one of the biggest tensions inside the studio:  practical knowledge versus theoretical knowledge and First Nations

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artists’ expectations and conceptions of both. More of this will be discussed in subsequent chapters but Elaine had a lot to say about how TAFE was perceived during those initial years as biased towards the First Nations arts programme. We wanted to get away from TAFE because it was so racist. We would be in a classroom and then someone would come in and say no this classroom is taken and then nobody would be in the room.13

Additionally, the first space the studio was allocated was a practice demountable which was used for trade students to learn how to put together and take a part – a second-hand space with no water, dirt floors to work in did nothing to alleviate feelings of racial bias. With the move to the cordial factory (around 1986), the feelings changed as although the studio was still under the TAFE umbrella, ‘we were separated from the campus. It was our space’. Anna Eglitis used to teach at St Monica’s as the head art teacher but then left to teach in the hospitality department at TAFE. Eglitis does not dispute Jenny’s or Elaine’s version of how the TAFE programme began. She describes her encounter with Tom and how she became involved in the ATSI arts course: I was already working here at the TAFE in hospitality. They wanted someone who was artistic, who could help them take on colours, perhaps do curtains and do things like that – for restaurants, to make the place look more beautiful; how to make colours and put flowers in vases together. It was a really strange one to me. So one day I  was teaching the students and Tom Vudrag comes in and says ‘shut up everybody, I want to talk to your teacher’. He says, ‘I want you to come over and work with us.’ Just like that! I  said, ‘doing what Tom?’ and he said, ‘I’m starting an Aboriginal arts course and I  want you over there. Come on! Pack up!’14

Anna was recruited by Tom in 1986 when art courses for Aboriginal students had already been running for two years. Her powerful legacy reshaped how people viewed the studio’s history. Anna moved the programme forward making it nationally famous (Demozay 2006). Her focus was centred on the students and helping them achieve their goals. Anna’s husband crafted the easels for students to use and she worked to better the circumstances in which artists created. We called this exhibition and invited everybody we could think of. And then the mob from the Department of Employment and Industrial Relations came and said ‘My God we’ve got to help you. Look at where you are working’ while they



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were kicking up dirt with their feet. After that, we got into the Cordial building for four years and then we got on to Bob Hawke and with his help too, we got into this [the Shed] building.15

The story of how then Prime Minister of Australia Bob Hawke became involved in the ATSI arts course is an amusing one. The Cairns TAFE campus hosted a Labour dinner party in the early 1990s in which the prime minister was scheduled to speak. Anna and three students – Zane Saunders, Jenny Green and Andrew Williams – decided to crash the dinner party. We didn’t ask permission from anybody, we just went in and hung pictures on the wall and sat down. When [Bob Hawke] started his speech, he was speaking politics and he would stare at us because there were three black faces and the paintings on the wall behind us. As soon as he finished talking, and everybody clapped and everything, he strode straight over to us and said, ‘what can I do for you?’ Just like that. We said, ‘we want some money’. And he said, ‘come on, come on over and show me your pictures. What’s this all about?’ We talked for about a quarter of an hour and our director came up and afterwards, Bob Hawke said, ‘don’t worry. I’ll follow this up.’ We were as cheeky as anything.16

This cheekiness resulted in R Block, a sprawling building on the TAFE campus, loaded with resources and facilities for First Nations arts. Anna was indeed adept at creating opportunities for students to take advantage of. It must be noted that this narrative is not meant to take away any of the well-deserved recognition of Anna Eglitis’s good work in the studio. The first-hand accounts of the course’s beginnings match the accounts Anna gave me herself; she never made any claim to starting the TAFE ATSI programme. However, the published literature credits Eglitis for both initiating and starting the programme, and this has had some negative effects upon previous students such as Jenny Martens. I asked Jenny if she ever participated in the TAFE arts programme after it had moved out of the Cordial building. I have never been back to TAFE. TAFE to me is all about [other people]. You know? … we were the ones that created those jobs for them. But we never get recognition for that.17

I asked Jenny how this made her feel: It makes you feel like you’re just a nobody. Sometimes. Because that’s why I went off last time. Number one because those old people that started off they are no

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Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art longer with us. Betty’s not with us. Shirley’s not with us. And you never get recognition – you don’t have to give names – just recognition to those that saw this dream and brought it to real. And also the guy who did the opening? The way he was dressed, that was just so disgusting. To me as an Indigenous person standing there and we are building bridges to our young generations, you know? You must come back, you gotta be here – because I heard you say that to them – and you got a man standing there with his work clothes on. Surely, you don’t have to be dressed in a suit or something but at least a little bit of respect for those young kids standing there with their beautiful artwork saying you know, I could be proud, we’re proud here today. He was just … I thought it was just … Just because we’re black fellas, we don’t have to dress down and come from work. I don’t know if he’s a mechanic or something but he was disgusting. I thought it was disgusting.18

There are two aspects of the contemporary ATSI arts course which Jenny is pointing out here. The first is something I hope I have alleviated in some way – the true beginnings of the arts course not as something which was instigated by instructors or the TAFE but by a strong initiative of Aboriginal and Islander people as well. The second aspect concerns the apparent lack of understanding of this history – the lack of pride and respect the instructor showed by dressing in work clothes seemed to Jenny incredibly disrespectful of the legacy she and her friends struggled to create and remember. The non-Indigenous instructor’s dress is interpreted in a very different light when balanced against the unacknowledged contributions of the early students and the continued focus on Anna Eglitis.

The pedagogy of the early studio Anna Eglitis laughs when she recalls teaching students in the early days. ‘I had them paint colour wheels until I thought they wanted to kill me!’ She would have the students do numerous colour studies as well as figurative work – all classical elements of the atelier studio. Students would pose for each other in lieu of hiring expensive professional models. Tom Vudrag left in 1986 and Ian and Ann Horn took over teaching the batik units and Shelia Sparks taught screenprinting. Anna Eglitis delivered the painting lessons and would do demonstration in technique. Demonstrations were the norm inside the studio and the Horns would provide a variety of different approaches to the batik process. Western art history was viewed through books and there were some lessons on art history such as looking at the human figure or in the use of colour, but as Anna pointed



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out, ‘the focus was not on Western art but Indigenous art’.19 There was also a lot of discussion and critiques of work during those days. As Anna describes it, ‘Arone [Meeks] did a good job in critiquing student works and working with students on their works.’20 Arone was one of the first artists-in-residence the programme had and he remembers those years fondly. Zane Saunders, a student from the 1990s, remarked, ‘[the atmosphere was] very structured but welcoming and passionate. [It was] a family environment, very ordered’.21 The high point of the TAFE studio was around 2000 when artists such as Brian Robinson, Lisa Michl, Shaun Edwards Kalk, Alick Tipoti, Dennis Nona, Ceferino Sabatino were becoming internationally known but the 1990s saw a great deal of activity which led to that high point. One of the hallmarks of the studio’s pedagogy was field trips. There were a number of trips to different events and places of cultural significance from Cape York to Sydney to Alice Springs. For example, during the early 1990s, the Tjapukai Cultural Centre was located in Kuranda and students would hop on a bus and visit the artworks there. Travel was much easier during the 1990s where instructors could book trains, hotels and flights with no problems.22 There was a lot of travel for the students during those early years. Trips to Sydney provided contacts with established artists and art groups such as the Boomalli Aboriginal Artists Cooperation. Artists such as Judy Watson and Arone Meeks made quite an impression. There were gallery visits and ‘cultural things’ students would be involved in.23 These trips to see other artworks were crucial. As Anna put it, ‘it’s important to go to exhibitions and galleries because you can critique the artworks and find out what is good and not so good in your own artworks’.24 There was of course a lot of fun too. Trips to the Opera House were a highlight and Anna told about how they would always stay in Manly mainly as an ‘excuse to go on the Ferry all the time’. Other trips included Brisbane where the students would exhibit at Queensland Aboriginal Creations. According to Anna, ‘[John Conroy] would have all the paintings up on the walls, catalogued and done. [QAC] would welcome us and we had yearly exhibitions [there]’.25 Elaine Lampton was one of the early students of the course and she remembers the field trips very well. Comments from students of the early days of the course as well as the instructors who participated in the course placed a heavy emphasis on the cultural content which included the trips to Laura to copy rock art images as well as the turning away from a focus on Western art history. These elements helped to create an atmosphere of acceptance and communal camaraderie among the students which was interpreted as ‘cultural’. Ursula Frederick’s honours paper

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explored the relationship between TAFE students and the rock art of Laura (1992). As she writes: Exposure to the beautiful and richly expressive rock art of the area has enabled the students to establish and affinity to the rock artists and encounter a great sense of pride in their Aboriginal heritage, as well as expanding their artistic and spiritual perception. (Frederick 1992: 31)

Anecdotally, I  was told that the use of Laura rock art was not sustainable as questions began to arise about the appropriateness of using those images in artworks. The development of the Aboriginal art industry is also the development of the concept of cultural copyright and I was told that students underwent some scrutiny when their works began to sell successfully. TAFE students without heritage links to Laura were not seen as appropriately culturally connected to use Quinkan imagery. Trips to Laura stopped because of funding issues but in part, it was also the question of cultural content which was to impede such outings. During these years, other exhibition opportunities were found locally in the Cairns region. The ballroom in the Pacifica Hotel was booked yearly for the student exhibition where artworks would inevitably sell out. During the 1990s, it cost ‘practically nothing’ to hire the Tanks where students would do all the hanging themselves to present their works. The studio during its early days was a place to produce art but engagement with the studio went beyond the demountable walls. Students went into the communities and cultural spaces around them to develop their artistic self. The studio was a place of many potential spaces.

Developing the curriculum The curriculum was developed by the TAFE system as a deliberate system of teaching culture in these spaces. In February 1992, the arts programme’s curriculum underwent a major review, particularly the diploma certification. A Curriculum Development Advisory Committee (hereafter the Committee) was established which included artists, traditional owners, industry representatives and educators.26 Previous students from the arts course as well as current students were included in the advising process. Important First Nations input came from a wide range of successful artists including Ron Hurley, Ephraim Bani, Mabel Edmund, Seith and Henrietta Fourmile, Jenuarrie and Julie Go-Sam.



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John Conroy from QAC was also included in these discussions as well as David Hudson, the founder of Tjapukai Cultural Park. This mix of First Nations participants and participants from what could be classified as the market sector provides an insight into the types of activities and forms of First Nations art the TAFE programme considered stakeholders in the development of a First Nations arts course. Other participants included representatives from Actors Equity and Contact Youth Theatre. The goal of the Committee was to ‘identify what are [the] course outcomes and how these are to be achieved’.27 Clearly First Nations arts and cultural practitioners were important to this endeavour as well as those institutions within mainstream Australia who could potentially be viewed as the further employers of successful graduates. From the beginning, the conceptualization of the course and its wording were paramount and proved to be a difficult assignment. Penny Henderson, the curriculum writer, expressed her frustrations in many letters about how tackling the ‘cultural content’ was a ‘very tricky endeavour’. In one letter, Henderson writes: The initial reaction has been that ‘traditional’ work cannot be taught within the framework of a TAFE course but further discussion is revealing that:  a) not to include aspects of traditional art is to downgrade the importance of the art form …; b) expertise in traditional art forms must be recognised within an award that has as its title … Aboriginal & Torres Strait Islander Visual Arts …; c) many prospective students and communities are anticipating that traditional aspects of art will be an integral part of the course; d) if the issues surrounding inclusion of traditional aspects are not tackled at this point, traditional issues and aspects will occur in a manner that is open to question and attack once the course is operating …; e) there is traditional content that can be studied, given the appropriate conditions and resources. (10 March 1992)28

These comments illustrate the link between the perceived ‘traditional’ and Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander visual arts. The lack of the traditional was seen as a ‘downgrade’ of the art which implies that the art is only valuable because it is Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander. The fact that the title of the course was about First Nations Australians, but the course did not have traditional aspects included was considered unusual. How can the course be Aboriginal or Islander if there is no focus on the traditional? Henderson writes about the communities’ desires for the traditional which legitimates the course’s focus as a form of selfdetermination. To not have the traditional means ignoring the community wishes. Henderson wisely notes that if the issues are not tackled now, they

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will become a problem and sees, in addition, an appropriate way of teaching traditional under certain conditions and circumstances. All of these references to a concept of the traditional would then bleed into definitions of the cultural when the curriculum was developed. Draft course structures in the archives suggest the range of programmes and units the Committee wanted to create. There were in effect three programmes:  visual arts, performing arts and music. Looking over the unit titles  – the individual courses required for certification – one can see there were a range of subjects the Committee wished to see implemented. Some of these include the more obvious choices of painting, ceramics, screenprinting and batiking  – units you would find in a mainstream programme. Some however were worded as ‘traditional’. There was ‘Traditional Weaving Skill I’, ‘Traditional Country Crafts’, ‘Traditional Carving’, ‘Traditional Dance I’, ‘Traditional Instruments’, ‘Traditional Storytelling’ and, interestingly, ‘Traditional 3D Body Ornamentation’.29 These were the units seen by the Committee as important for First Nations urban artists to learn and explore in the TAFE programme. There were also units planned for subjects potentially seen as ‘outside’ the ‘traditional’ (they were certainly not labelled as such) including jewellery making, exploratory graphics, experimental fibres, creative dance, creative drama, papermaking, life drawing, print making and photography. There were units on ‘Multicultural Arts’ which were described as exploring ‘art forms from various cultures’ and there were suggestions on including field trips to communities.30 The philosophy behind the programmes was to cover the important strands of the course’s components. As recorded in the archives: The strand, through all three levels, needs to cover: History – precontact, postcontact, contemporary lifestyles Personal awareness of politics (contemporary issues) Trading and bartering system (external influences) Kinship/genealogy/family tree (totems, skin) 3 art forms – literature, visual, performing Traditional significance of artifacts [sic] Relationship with environment Elders’ input Technology (materials) Cultural maintenance Gatherings of tribes



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Myths & legends Legislation/use of materials Techniques Stories31

A note explains the emphasis as ‘those areas underlined were felt to be necessary inclusions at a certificate level’. This meant that these areas were considered ‘core’ areas which needed to be covered early in a student’s education path. Finally, the closing comment on these strands is as follows: The modules are compulsory within the course structure, intended to be taught as an integral part of the entire course, and being written so as not to enforce preconceived ideas upon the students. The general intention of the course is to encourage exploration, individuality and a personally defined artistic and political philosophy. (Emphasis added)32

As subsequent chapters will illustrate, there was a great deal of pressure on students during the 2010 field period to create ‘Indigenous’ artworks. The curriculum created in the 1990s – amidst an atmosphere of attempting to right colonial wrongs and connect disenfranchised people to their culture  – would have long-lasting effects once this period passed. The idea that Aboriginal and Islander culture would be problematic for Aboriginal and Islander people was not a conceivable reality at this time. Before moving on to how the 1990s TAFE programme saw itself, it is beneficial to examine one of these courses in more detail in order to see how it was conceived of during this time. ‘Aboriginal Painting I’ had as its goal ‘to enable the student to use traditional Aboriginal painting styles and techniques; within technical, legal and ethical limitations’.33 Difficulties with this unit were identified in specific terms surrounding issues of cultural protocols, ‘secret’ knowledge and gender-based restrictions regarding content. There did not seem to be issues with the use of the word ‘traditional’ which was used eight times in five different ways: traditional Aboriginal painting, traditional materials, traditional types of implements, traditional forms and traditional inspiration. The unit does not prescribe what traditional might mean but its use is highly suggestive of a specific form of precontact conceptualizations of painting. Additionally, a heavy emphasis on the ‘traditional and ethical responsibilities’ of Aboriginal painting runs concurrently through the unit and in ‘Aboriginal Painting II’ there is the addition of ‘traditional stories’. In ‘Aboriginal Painting III’, the student is further asked to ‘identify and substantiate a personal, traditional, Aboriginal influence’ which means relating

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to a specific Aboriginal person in a society with whom the artist can create a rapport. The series of Aboriginal painting units then heavily focused on and were structured around specific forms of Aboriginal identity and practice. This way of focusing on ‘traditional forms’ of art as well as ‘traditional ethics’ allowed the Committee to address the issue of cultural copyright and past perceived infringements. Subsequent chapters will engage with the long-lasting effects of the curriculum on First Nations students, but it is important to note that the curriculum was not the only emphasis on cultural content and cultural abilities during this time. The cultural rhetoric found in the curriculum was echoed in the published and public accounts of the TAFE programme by the students and staff.

The rhetoric of cultural abilities Anna told me that the materials inside the studio were hard won through First Nations students’ efforts both in exhibitions and with diligence to their studies. She says, ‘Presses were purchased [with] Indigenous moneys – they are not TAFE machines they are Indigenous arts machines. They don’t have the right to take them away.’ The purpose of the course was to ‘actually have people who could learn the skills in visual arts and then take it back to their community and from there, show their young people’.34 The First Nations arts programme is a unique space which sprang up from Aboriginal and Islander people in Cairns wanting to do something ‘more’. It was arguably conceived of as a space to explore an identity which had been repressed by mainstream society and which was not being represented in other courses. It was a way of making the invisible visible. There were ideas which were lofty, romantic and ambitious but rooted in a time when large international travelling shows of Aboriginal art were just beginning to happen. Zane Saunders, a successful artist and graduate of the course, began as an underage student (‘I was probably 16 – under age – but because of my height, they thought I was older’) and was encouraged by his mother to enrol in the arts programme. In his words: If we didn’t have that [ATSI studio] it would be in a lot of ways a struggle. There [inside the studio] we get to be ourselves and become more stronger in ourselves and say whether this is okay or not. Sometimes when you are with others – other groups or non-Indigenous  – it’s hard to be yourself. You’re a minority not a



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majority. It’s a good learning experience to go through that. Some of them may have had that environment. They might have grown up in that environment and had that sort of cultural work.35

There was a conception during this time of multivalent expressions of First Nations identity. Elaine describes the process of exploring these different forms of identity as well, admitting that for people who have been disconnected with what might be called traditional culture or communities on country, the journey towards discovery can be more difficult but not impossible or without choices. Mainly urban people find it a bit hard finding their identity. If you don’t know your totem, what do you do? Well, you do something about your own life or what protocols do you have in your family. Have you experienced racism? Looking for jobs? What’s it like living in Cairns as a black person? A lot of them knew sort of where they came from. … But yeah, just using symbols, what symbol would you use as an urban blackfella? Come up with your own symbol! Come up with your own identity!36

The students’ disconnect with country and concepts of the traditional created a very specific rhetoric in the published accounts of TAFE. Anna herself describes the art production and creative inspiration of the First Nations art students, emphasizing such concepts as experimentation and individuality (1990:  83). Anna writes about the students’ exposure to rock art through field trips as a dominate form of creative inspiration. In Anna’s view, the students ‘immediately identified with the [rock art] paintings’ which opened up a ‘whole new visual vocabulary’ (1990: 83). This exposure to rock art paintings was reflected in the texturing and careful attention to the ‘all-important’ background of any work (Eglitis 1990:  84). Experimentation with linocuts and batik was a ‘natural medium’ for the students as a further reflection of their ‘memory of traditional painting on textured bark or stone’ (Eglitis 1990: 84). Of the Torres Strait Islander students, Anna remarks on their ‘instinct for carving’ and their association and production of art in which ‘coral-like forms, undersea creations’ and the like dominate (ibid.). Anna writes that students are following their First Nations artistic identity and what she calls a ‘true path’ based on understanding ‘his or her family’s cultural heritage’ (Eglitis 1990: 83). Mark Hollingsworth was an Aboriginal student at the TAFE and had the opportunity to travel with other students to Darwin to give a paper at a symposium. Hollingsworth’s language is direct and highly narrative. Of particular interest are the identity tensions he describes although always with

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a note of optimism towards the future. For example, Hollingsworth talks about urban art versus traditional art versus contemporary art. Hollingsworth writes about being irritated in having to explain to tourists and gallery owners about his art and arguing against their conservative views and perceptions about the nature of Aboriginal art (1993:  48). Two other artists make brief statements in this symposium paper, both of whom stress issues of identity within their art production. Unlike Anna’s writings, there is no emphasis on ‘traditional techniques’ or natural talents but rather an emphasis on technical appropriateness in art production and availability of both knowledgeable instructors and materials. Hollingsworth admits that what is done at the TAFE could be considered ‘contemporary’ art but is quick to stress that ‘people that come from more traditional areas, they do their thing. People that have got no background in traditional type art do their thing’ (Hollingsworth 1993:  49). Hollingsworth stresses cultural identity, finding one’s roots and the importance of having First Nations conveners and mentors within the visual arts programme (Hollingsworth 1993: 49–50). There is an attempt here to create an authenticity of practice at the TAFE. Anna uses words such as ‘natural’ and ‘cultural memory’ to place artists working in the TAFE studio as legitimately ‘Indigenous’. In some ways, these discourses are part of the constructed reality of the arts programme – it is not traditional or ‘natural’. In other ways, we are seeing the legacy of QAC’s decades-long practice of importing non-local forms of First Nations art which has left large swathes of Queensland communities with an artistic form of existential questions: who are we and what are our art forms? The ‘who are we’ comes through an internalization of culture and self – without ‘culture’, we are ‘nothing’. QAC’s practice not only ended up creating tensions between local artists and artists from other nonQueensland communities but left the artists with serious questions about the forms for expression their art should take as well as their personal identities. During the early history of the TAFE programme, instructors and students were active in publishing about the TAFE experience. The discourse in these publications reinforces specific aspects of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander culture while helping to create legitimacy and an authority surrounding the methods used in the course. The key early writings were published between 1990 and 1993 after Anna Eglitis became the course’s lead instructor. Edmund’s original piece on the historical development of the arts course says little about the cultural content of the curriculum. What she does do is address the assumptions the TAFE had with regard to the type of arts First Nations people wanted to learn.



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One of the reactions [Tom] received from the Education Department was surprise that he should think the Aboriginal people would want to do anything other than their accepted traditional art forms. Another objection was that if the concepts of modern art were introduced to Aborigines, it would destroy the originality of their work. In other words, corrupt them with knowledge. (Edmund 1990: 109)

What these assumptions create from the very beginning of the course’s history is a tension between what the administration thinks of First Nations fine arts and what the students want to do as First Nations people doing fine art. Potentially because of these assumptions, the tone of the written works published focuses on establishing cultural associations and connectedness. There was certainly a perceived need to address cultural content and the appropriate use of it in contemporary works. The legacy of QAC no doubt aided in the need to focus on cultural content as it was defined by the Committee building the advanced certification programmes. The next chapter explores these themes and the continuing development of a First Nations fine art aesthetic.

Notes 1 The arrival of non-Indigenous people to Australia is obviously a very contentious issue. For many First Nations peoples, this day is called Invasion Day. For non-Indigenous Australians, it’s called the arrival of the First Fleet and is a day to celebrate. Further discussion of this polarizing topic is beyond the scope of this book to address. 2 Queensland State Archives Item ID646441, Correspondence, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander. Further details: 15 May 1992 letter from John Conroy to Mr J. Burless, executive officer, Welfare Services Branch. 3 In today’s spelling, it is considered respectfully appropriate to capitalize Indigenous when referring to First Nations peoples. 4 Queensland State Archives Item ID642197, Correspondence, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander. Further details: the file folders contained all the course outlines for 1983–4 and were all labelled as from the ‘Officer-in-Charge Aboriginal and Islander TAFE services’. 5 Queensland State Archives Item ID642197, Correspondence, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander. Further details: course outline signed off on 25 October 1983. 6 Queensland State Archives Item ID642197, Correspondence, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander. Further details: course outline signed off on 14 November 1983. 7 Queensland State Archives Item ID642197, Correspondence, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander. Further details: course outline signed off on 8 June 1983.

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8 Queensland State Archives Item ID642197, Correspondence, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander. Further details: course outline signed off on 1 November 1983. 9 Queensland State Archives Item ID642197, Correspondence, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander. Further details: course outline signed off but undated. Course noted to commence 3 October 1983. 10 Personal communication, 22 September 2010. 11 Ibid. 12 Personal communication, 15 June 2010. 13 Ibid. 14 Personal communication, 21 September 2010. 15 Ibid. 16 Ibid. 17 Personal communication, 22 September 2010. 18 Ibid. 19 Personal communication, 14 December 2010. 20 Ibid. 21 Personal communication, 21 May 2010. 22 Compared to the intense legal and insurance documentation required to book such transport during the 2010 field period, even a trip to the Cairns Art Gallery was often fraught with bureaucratic red tape. 23 Anna Eglitis, personal communication, 14 December 2010. 24 Ibid. 25 Ibid. 26 Queensland State Archives Item ID646409, Correspondence, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander. Further details: meeting minutes from 11 and 12 February 1992. This item number at the Queensland State Archives contains a huge amount of data on the development of the Cairns ATSI arts course – not all of which can be included in this chapter. 27 Ibid. 28 Queensland State Archives Item ID646409, Correspondence, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander. Further details: meeting minutes from 11 and 12 February 1992. 29 Queensland State Archives Item ID646409, Correspondence, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander. Further details: Coursework matrix from 22 June 1992, included in the meeting minutes from 11 September 1992. 30 Ibid. 31 Queensland State Archives Item ID646409, Correspondence, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander. Further details: meeting minutes 11 and 12 February 1992. Original emphasis. 32 Queensland State Archives Item ID646409, Correspondence, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander. Further details: meeting minutes 11 and 12 February 1992.



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33 Queensland State Archives Item ID646409, Correspondence, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander. Further details: meeting minutes 11 September 1992. 34 Personal communication, 14 December 2010. 35 Personal communication, 21 May 2010. 36 Personal communication, 15 June 2010.

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4

The studio today

The First Nations arts studio today is known by several names:  the Shed, the ATSI studio, the sweat shop or simply just the studio (Figure  5). Each name is said with affection and a familiarity that comes with a sense of ownership and pride at the studio’s First Nations status. The dynamics of the studio today are quite different from its historical origins, but one thread remains consistent. That thread is keeping the studio ‘Indigenous’ which was at risk by the constant threat of ‘mainstreaming’. Mainstreaming is the process of making something which was once only open to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander students into something which is essentially open to all students. The First Nations arts programme is both physically and administratively housed on the TAFE campus. The studio is located inside R Block, a V-shaped structure with one entire arm devoted to the First Nations arts department (‘arts’) and another arm for ‘arts and culture’. The naming of these two arms is highly questionable today. At one point, the entire building was devoted to First Nations arts, dance and music. As was illustrated in Chapter 3, the very construction of the R Block was for the purpose of First Nations arts education. Today, both the dance and music departments have been mainstreamed. This means that the programme would be open to First Nations and non-Indigenous students. Both staff and students referred to the music and dance departments as ‘lost’. ‘When we lost the music/dance program’ was a common way of referring to the mainstreaming of those programmes. The courses still exist but the fact that they are open to all students was interpreted to mean that they were no longer available to First Nations students. In reality, the programmes were still very much open to all students (and occasionally, First Nations students enrolled) but their mainstreaming rendered them symbolically closed to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander students who talked to me about it. The arts programme at TAFE is actually twofold. There is a First Nations-only programme and there is a programme for ‘everyone’ or, as First Nations staff

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and students called it, there was a mainstream arts programme and an ATSI (Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander) arts programme. The mainstream arts programme was located in Y Block, just south of the longest arm of R Block. The two buildings which made up the Y Block were three small demountables where the mainstream student gallery and painting studios were located. Ceramics had their own building in L Block, on the other side of the ATSI administration offices. This was a much larger and finished building with several studios for wheel throwing and sculpting as well as several firing rooms and storage racks. The make-up of these two non-Indigenous spaces is important to note, especially in comparison to the ATSI studio. Inside R Block, there are a number of different activities taking place. R Block includes an administrative centre, two art studios with an office for instructors, an art gallery, a small stadium theatre, and rooms for dance, music and Information Technology/computer education. The administrative centre is located at the base of the V-shaped building and is where potential First Nations students meet with advisors, obtain help with forms and funding as well as counselling and enrolment advice. There is a main administrative centre for all TAFE students located in a different part of the campus where everyone obtains identification cards and pays fees, but the R Block administrative centre caters to the special activities within R Block. Located across from the administrative offices, on the side of the ‘arts and culture’ arm, is the theatre where music students perform. Across the administrative centre along the ‘arts’ arm is the art gallery. During the fieldwork period, the art studios – the arts arm – was the only department not ‘mainstreamed’. This sense of a division in R Block  – of having sections of the ATSI arts and culture programme mainstreamed  – was a major point of conversation throughout the 2010  year. Students of the ATSI arts course knew that at one point, the entirety of R Block once ‘belonged to them’. The fear of the arts course being mainstreamed – being taken over by the general student body and open to mainstream instructors – was something the students felt they were actively fighting against. In some ways, this was reinforced by the layout of R Block. The studio was literally surrounded by mainstream arts programmes (music, ceramics, painting, dance, etc.). Staff from the mainstream department were even housed inside the same office room as the two First Nations instructors. This did not look good in the students’ opinion as they felt their ‘space’ being ‘overrun’ by mainstream interests. The students’ feelings of being overrun and having their spaces encroached upon were further exacerbated by comparisons of the staffing between the mainstream



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and ATSI studios. The mainstream arts programme had four instructors and additional administrative staff. From my inquiries, I  knew that not all of these instructors were full-time. Some only taught one or two courses a semester and while others did teach more, the students’ perception was of ‘a lot of instructors’ compared to the one and a half instructors the ATSI studio had. During the 2000s, the First Nations arts studio had five full- and three-quarters-time staff delivering courses under the direction of Anna Eglitis. When Anna retired in 2007, it was at the end of a long line of instructors retiring or leaving to do other projects. None of these instructors were replaced except for Anna, leaving just one full-time and one part-time staff. Elaine Lampton took over as lead instructor but in her words, ‘I was only picked because I was the last one standing!’ Within the studio, there was a lot of effort made by the two lone instructors to engage with the students, but more often than not, meetings and an incredible amount of bureaucratic paperwork kept them away. This is important to note  – bureaucratic paperwork physically kept instructors out of the studio, leaving students alone for hours. The First Nations arts programme had little administrative support from their parent department. During 2010, one and a half instructors were expected to manage a programme with 37 students across three certification levels  – Certificate III, Certificate IV and Diploma  – while teaching all the varieties of artistic practices including batik, screenprinting, acrylic and oil painting, linoprinting, drawing, theory and history. Additionally, one and a half instructors also had to keep the supply room stocked, the computer records up to date, and complete all the assessment marking while putting on three exhibitions a year. It was simply an unrealistic workload, and class instruction, let  alone one-on-one instruction, was often the activity that was sacrificed. Added to all of this was the continuous threat of the studio being mainstreamed because of ‘poor’ performance. Poor performance included students dropping out, failing to complete assessments and low marks. The onus of learning relied on 30 minutes of weekly instruction and demonstration at most. From those 30 minutes, students had to perform all the tasks necessary to complete the unit and gain the knowledge to perform the techniques involved. Intermittent instruction throughout the week did happen, but these moments were continuously interrupted by administrative duties and obligations. The feelings of being encroached upon by the mainstream arts programme and the fear of the ATSI programme being mainstreamed were further fuelled by the fact the ATSI programme had the best equipment. The main studio, the Shed, was a large, open space room with entire walls of windows which allowed for a large amount of natural light. The studio includes two types of presses – one

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lithographic press and three etching and linoprinting presses. There was also a long table for screenprinting that was specially padded and included storage space for screens underneath the table. These printing facilities were the only ones available on the entire campus and although mainstream instructors tried to get permission from the First Nations instructors to use these facilities, permission was never granted. Negotiations were framed in terms of the mainstream ‘trying to take over’ the First Nations studio space. Given the loss of the music and dance programmes, such fears were not ungrounded. The other main section of the studio is located on the opposite side of the Shed – this is the batik workstation and was the only facility of its kind on the TAFE campus. The station includes eight tubs for dyeing, two boiling kettles for removing wax from fabric, a washing machine, hose spickets and drying racks. Additionally, the floor of the station is sunken and covered by a metal grate to allow water to drip and drain away. The batik stations were a highly specialized space, specifically created and designed for the purpose of fabric dyeing. The mainstream art studio spaces had nothing like these facilities. The studios were set inside smaller demountables with more emphasis placed on drawing and painting techniques. The student gallery was larger than the ATSI one but with crumbling walls, dirty floors and substandard lighting. The Banggu Minjaany Art Gallery was carpeted, fitted with high-quality lighting and had its own entryway with a well-designed sign and a sculpture of a rainforest shield. The best art facilities at the TAFE were found inside the Shed. Superficially, the differences between the two studios and their available supplies seemed incongruent. Without a strong sense of the history behind the TAFE programme  – the ‘cheeky’ infiltration of a Labour function to solicit support from the prime minister which garnered the funds to build R Block in the first place – the claim that these facilities were solely for the use of Aboriginal and Islander people did not make sense for non-Indigenous staff. The fact remains, the Shed was funded specifically for First Nations use and contemporary First Nations staff and students had to constantly remind everyone. How people saw the studio reflected the many ways they saw themselves as individuals coming into the programme. This research would not even have been possible without the active engagement of the TAFE students during the 2010  year and the many other students who put up with an anthropologist, running around camps and writing everything down. Most students who participated in the research wanted their individual names to be used in the book and those names are used with permission. Some students however will be known by a pseudonym in order to protect their privacy as some of the



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Table 4.1  Active participants in the research Name

Identification

Michelle Weare Kel Williams Pellista Lammon Ian Jenkins Lynelle Flinders Tommy Pau Eddie Sam Darren Blackman Charlie Sailor Liz Saveka

Aboriginal Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Torres Strait Islander Aboriginal Aboriginal Torres Strait Islander Torres Strait Islander Aboriginal Torres Strait Islander Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander

situations described might give cause for offense or embarrassment. Most of the students were mature-aged students  – typically over 35  years. There were only a handful of students who were between 18 and 25 years old. This older demographic produced a specific atmosphere which will become apparent. The main participants for this study are listed in Table 4.1. The biography being developed here is not about individual artists but about the studio and the artworks being produced inside the studio. As such, individual profiles will not be produced in ways commonly seen in other ethnographies. In many ways, this is to respect the privacy of the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander artists in this study and the fact that their private lives outside the studio are not for me to write about. Fundamentally, this study is about the artworks produced inside the studio and how the artists articulate the hows and whys of this production. There are four key concepts to understanding the students’ stated expectations and conceptions of the studio. These four concepts are: ways of identifying, reasons for enrolling in the course, how the atmosphere of the course is perceived and thoughts on mainstreaming the course.

Ways of identifying Ways of identifying can range according to the different hierarchies individuals choose to emphasize. There is no one answer to this question. Generally, when artists choose to identify in general terms, they answer as either Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander. A  number of students also had South Sea heritage and would describe themselves as ‘Murri-Kanaka’. Some students were put off by the

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entire episode which did not start with my questioning but the very process of entering the ATSI studio. Liz answered the identity question as follows: Before they ask me to break it down, I just say I’m a Queenslander. I don’t want to be breaking it down to a colour really. Because there’s always good and bad that come with everything. Just keep it general.1

Kel answered the question by saying it was a process of finding out who you were. Some students have very complex identities and these complexities are difficult to qualify. Michelle identifies as an Aboriginal woman from the Tablelands but is quick to point out she also has a ‘Japanese, Chinese, Aboriginal, Torres Strait Islander and South Sea Islander’ heritage. Tommy also has a complex heritage and resents the whole concept of having to identify with a single term. In his words, he doesn’t want to identify: Because then you box yourself in because your artwork will always be seen as an Indigenous artist. If I  do a mainstream piece of work it will always be seen from an Indigenous point of view. Probably be read from my back ground because I am an Indigenous person rather than what I’ve painted or drawn or the artwork I’ve created. It will always have a hidden … what do you call it … meaning or something. But I don’t want to be called an Indigenous artist. Just an artist because I want to explore all different kinds of forms. Like I said before if I’m going to be labelled as an Indigenous artist, then I’ll be limited to my region. Then limited to my clan group and then limited to my family’s stories. And there only so much you can do with a couple of stories you know? So I’d rather be broader and sort of explore more art styles and concepts and other cultures. That’s because what I said, because of my background, I’m Asian, Pacific Islander and Papua New Guinea. It’s not evident in my look or anything, I’d like to explore all those cultures and then try and find a form that brings them all together or a style and make it sort of my own unique style.2

For Tommy, identifying was a method of pigeon-holing his artistic creativity, but what is also evident is the number of assumptions made in identifying as Torres Strait Islander. The limitation of stories from his family’s clan is part of a wider discussion going within the Islander art movement about cultural protocols. These protocols are being negotiated in various ways which nevertheless influences current arts practices. I  am not allowed yet to talk about these protocols but other assumptions, such as being unable to explore Asian motifs or Aboriginal concepts, are valid.3 The arts market wants a certain style of art from First Nations people. Tommy was not alone in this frustration.



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Lynelle and Pellista both feel that the root of their identities lies in being a Christian. Each identifies as Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander (respectively) but when asked about their identity, Lynelle said: Art is just what I do. But how I am yup. Is a Christian. I’m a born again Christian. I  identify myself as a born again Christian. Then I’m a mother. I  can’t be a wife. Not yet anyway. Soon. Mother, daughter, friend, blah blah blah. First and foremost, it’s who I am in Christ. That’s me, that’s my identity.4

These first sets of examples illustrate that some people’s initial conceptions of themselves are not through a specific or even generalized concept of Indigeneity but something else altogether. Liz’s pride in being a Queenslander and Lynelle’s and Pellista’s preference for their Christian identities show that Indigeneity is not always the primary way to identify for First Nations people. On the other side of this discussion are those within the studio who identify specifically with a tribal affiliation and feel very strongly about promoting that identity. Ian describes himself as a Yidinji man from the clan-group Wanyurr-Majay/Madyjandyji or Lower Coastal Yidinji. Darren describes himself as both from the Gabbi Gabbi/ Goolum nations and the Batujula tribe from the Bundaberg, Hervey Bay and Fraser Island areas. Additionally, Torres Strait Islander students would always qualify their heritage/identity as coming from a particular island group. For example, two Torres Strait Islander students pointed out that they were from Mabuiag and Boigu Islands. The other Islanders in the classroom were all from Darnley/Erub Island but made a point of signifying the difference this made from the western islands and that it should be duly noted. These forms of identifying are complex. What became apparent was that in the first part of the school year, during those first critical weeks, people sat within the classroom according to how they identified. The first day of class included a getting-to-know-you session and by the end of it, students knew generally who was who. Subsequently, Aboriginal students sat next to other Aboriginal students and Islanders sat with Islanders. This was a temporary division however because as the school year progressed, those divisions were broken down and seating in the classroom took on a different reflection of how people saw themselves. It became more about shared artistic practices although the younger Islander students were careful to position themselves close to those in the studio who held a great deal of cultural knowledge but were students enrolled at the TAFE to gain cultural knowledge? As with identifying, these reasons are diverse.

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Reasons for enrolling in the course The arts programme was directly advertised to potential students in 2010. TAFE promoted their array of First Nations programmes through flyers as well as having an internet presence and links to government agencies such as Centrelink. Centrelink is the public face of Australia’s Department of Human Services responsible for providing ‘access to social, health and other payments and services’.5 Word of mouth was by far the most common way people heard about the programme, but its representation to the public at large proved to be a reflection of how the course saw itself as well. The studio was advertised through an A4 handout, promoting all the specialized First Nations courses available at the TAFE. These handouts were available at the front desk of the administration offices on campus and around downtown Cairns on café and business windows. The handout asks, ‘Want a deadly career?’ The term ‘deadly’ is employed here as the most desirable of outcomes, implying proficiency and success as well as social acceptance among First Nations peers. Along the left-hand side of the sheet, several TAFE careers are listed along with dance and visual arts. Some examples include policy worker, library assistant, vacation care worker and administrative officer. This offering of an arts career as obtainable through a TAFE programme is a beguiling one and very different from arts courses in the mainstream department where there are no advertising campaigns and the arts are more of an avenue for personal development. Yet the poster also includes, underneath the banner head at the very top, the statement that there are a number of courses available for a First Nations person looking for ‘extra skills, knowledge and confidence to score your dream job or commence university’. It is a representation of the course which caters to both desires for a career pathway and for skills. This duality of purpose behind the course is reflective of the history of TAFE programmes in Queensland. Although students had various personal reasons for enrolling into the TAFE First Nations arts programme, there were many which were held in common. The first thing which struck me when hearing the answers the students gave was that no one enrolled in the course thinking to do ‘art for art’s sake’. There were no housewives or older retirees who wanted to start a hobby or gain some experience, experimenting in different artistic mediums. This might be because students had to enrol full-time in order to obtain the financial aid needed to fund the course. Another reason could be the way the course was advertised – as



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a way to have a ‘career’ in arts. But even this is slightly problematic as careers in the arts industry are highly competitive and extremely difficult to achieve. Additionally, art careers generally take more than a TAFE degree. So what then were people’s expectations of the course? Why did students enrol and why did they choose the First Nations arts course and not the mainstream one? One of the reasons some students chose to enrol was because of the encouragement of friends and family. These reasons spanned the very personal to the everyday form of support. Darren told me how the unfortunate death of his brother – an arts coordinator up in Aurukun – made him realize how much of his own creativity he was stifling. He was inspired to continue his brother’s legacy and he did so by enrolling in the music course at TAFE. He gravitated to the arts course after seeing some of the exhibitions and activities happening in the Shed. Lynelle was encouraged by her pastor. In her words: One day [my pastor] asked me if I could paint. I said yup. Because he has some Indigenous paintings in his house, Aboriginal art, whatever you want to call it. I said Oh yeah I can do that. I haven’t done it for a while, but I can do it. So why aren’t you doing it now? you know? Every excuse under the sun. He just kept at me, ‘now Lynelle I don’t know if it’s … All I can see is a canvas. I don’t know if it’s your life that’s painted on it. Or you need to do something about it. About the art.’ I’m like, fair enough. He sees something in me I don’t quite yet see. I’ll get there. I’ll get there.6

Other students had sisters, friends and parents tell them about the TAFE programme and how the First Nations arts programme was a good one. The reputation of TAFE is known in the community and when families and friends saw their loved ones do well in their sketches, they were encouraged to go to the TAFE. This was true for Lynelle and also Liz, Allen, Peter and Jack. Encouragement through their social networks was one of the main reasons students gave for being at the TAFE. Kel and Tommy deliberately chose the TAFE ATSI programme on their own desires to network and be with other First Nations artists. Kel wanted to develop an understanding of the different types of visual arts such as printing, fabric and acrylic painting. Kel had previous experience with the arts as a successful stall holder in the region’s outdoor markets selling his boomerangs, wooden sculptures and carved bowls. Kel is a wood carver by training, having worked in shipyards in New Zealand. Tommy has worked in digital mediums as well as line

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drawing for years. At one point, he had tried starting up a t-shirt business with TSI motifs. In his words: I came mainly for support and networking. Cause if I wanted to network with Indigenous artists and network with galleries attached with Indigenous artists, that’s what I really wanted to find out. New avenues and pathways to go.7

Tommy would later in the year fight against the assumptions which went with being a First Nations artist, but this is quite different from wanting to expand opportunities for exhibition. The attraction of the programme was in the networking and potential pathways First Nations arts provided. He was unprepared for the limitations which went along with those pathways. On the whole, the desire for networking and being with other First Nations artists extended to concepts of culture and exploring those concepts comfortably and openly in the classroom. In casual discussion, I was told that having other students around all working on the same cultural ‘problem’ was a good thing to be exposed to. Other reasons for enrolling were more pragmatic. Charlie came to Cairns to find work but was unable to find anything. In his words it was ‘too hard for me’. He decided to come to TAFE in order ‘to use my skills and come do art. … It’s really good. I  could get out and do something. I  didn’t know anything about art. I didn’t know you could do that.’ Charlie had done drawing and wood carving before coming to the TAFE but the idea of having it become a career or a pathway to work was new for him. Charlie grew up on Darnley Island and was young. His attempt at finding a job in Cairns was very different than what he expected. He found the TAFE programme much more acceptable and enjoyable. Ian was involved in CDEP8 projects in Gordonvale, painting murals and doing general carpentry. When the CDEP programme was shut down, things changed. According to Ian: Well we had to close and [they] put us into mainstream employment. So we had to do workshops and stuff. We had to get jobs. Programs and job search programs and yeah. Well, we was in this job search program for us ‘oh yeah within 4 weeks we’ll get you a job. 4 to 6 weeks.’ We was there for four months. We did odd jobs here and there. Yeah. In between, a job, a week here, one or two days there. Yeah. So I decided to do TAFE, get back doing my art. I was doing arts there [CDEP].9

Ian and Charlie both took initiatives to start the TAFE programme when other work opportunities were unavailable, but other students were placed in the



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programme in lieu of work. One student was on a work placement programme coordinated by Centrelink. She was told there was an ‘opening’ in the TAFE arts studio and if she was interested in going there. She jumped on the chance and was enrolled through Centrelink. Other students were in the TAFE programme through accident. Heather, a Hope Vale resident, wanted to work in the arts centre and was told she had to do the TAFE First Nations arts programme. Pellista wanted to do fashion design and had only been aware of the mainstream programme. When the administrator found out she was a Torres Strait Islander, they took the initiative to enrol her in the First Nations programme. This had an incredible effect on her sense of self as the ATSI course asks very different things from a student than a mainstream course. When I rang to enrol, they asked if I was a Torres Strait Islander, and they just sort of automatically slot me into that. Because I thought when I was going to come to TAFE, I was going to be with different students, we weren’t in a separate thing. First time I went to TAFE, I did a business course, it was like mainstream. There was no Indigenous, there was no separation. It was like everything together. So I thought applying for this course I would come to TAFE and I would be with different students with different cultures but then when I turned up it was like, this was the Indigenous block. Identity? And I’m like ‘oh no!’ . There’s a part of me that thinks this isn’t important because mum didn’t think it was important so I … Yeah, I took that from her. It’s not important. Then by finding out like I told you that family tree to my father’s side and I thought it wouldn’t affect me but then it was like ‘oh, I don’t even know who I am!!’ I’m just starting to try and find myself and then I’m thrown off in a different direction.10

Pellista is referencing the moment when she found out where her grandfather’s name Caledonia came from – that it was a name given to him by white missionaries because of his origin, not because it was his family name. Not prepared for what the course entailed, Pellista went through several such revelations about who she ‘really’ was. The responsibility the TAFE had in putting a student in a course like this was never fully explored. I suspected that because enrolment numbers meant more money for the programme, any student who identified as First Nations was put into the programme whether they specifically asked for it or not. This assumption turned out to be problematic. There was one student I met who identified as an Aboriginal woman but was enrolled in the mainstream visual arts programme. When the students from the First Nations programme participated in a mainstream painting unit, the Aboriginal woman

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was surprised and a bit shocked at seeing so many other ‘blackfellas’. She had been completely unaware of any First Nations arts programme at the TAFE. I overheard her once, asking another student, ‘why wasn’t I invited to join your group?’ Clearly, there are issues with the enrolment process at the TAFE in general as well as a variety of reasons behind why students wanted to enrol. Whatever their backgrounds and rationale, in the end, these students were heaped together, for better or worse.

The atmosphere of the course The TAFE programme had created a separate mainstream programme on the success of the First Nations arts course, deliberately creating two separate domains of arts production and learning. As noted already, there was some confusion in this duality. Once enrolment processes were complete, how did students react to the environment of the course? How did they feel about the atmosphere that was maintained by these two separate domains? What were some of the tensions which arose in the studio? A few students had no real feelings about the atmosphere of the studio. They responded with saying things like ‘fine’ or ‘alright’. Some compared their previous experience in secondary school. Lynelle said, ‘I hated going to school. I  look forward to coming every day. Must be alright.’ Charlie said he felt ‘welcomed’ and that he was ‘happy to be here every day.’ The feeling of being welcomed and the comparison to mainstream school creates an impression that the atmosphere of the studio – created by an all First Nations student body – does affect people’s attitudes towards school in general. Darren spoke specifically about the student body and make-up in the studio. He told me: The overall thing I like is the communal thing in our class. I spent so much time there because it’s such a break away from music. Over in music it’s too serious and the people are sometimes negative. When I  go away to art there’s always people who are positive, you know? So it just feels good being there.11

This positivity extends to the sharing of artistic approaches which comes with a culturally mixed environment. Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander students make up the student body and inside the studio, there is a feeling of togetherness – that all the students are working together to achieve something. These feelings of togetherness will be discussed further in the next section where I discuss the



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threat of mainstreaming the programme. For now, it is enough to remark that students came together as ‘Indigenous’ artists and that this was appreciated by many in the studio. Ian remarked on how much he learned from Torres Strait Islander students and how he enjoyed the diversity of artistic styles. In his words, ‘I like their style – you know Tommy’s style, bloody Peter’s style. I get ideas.’ Liz joked about the supposed rivalry between the two groups: Of course Aboriginal persons think they’re better than the Islanders and the Islanders think they’re better than the Aboriginals. And the Aboriginals love their shake-a-leg dance and the Islanders, you’ll see them go ‘oh that gammon dance’. They think theirs is better but nothing over the top.12

Overall there was a very communal feeling inside the studio. This was in part due to the fact that almost everyone inside the studio found themselves related in some way. Peter turned out to be Liz’s uncle  – something she told me she ‘discovered’ after thinking he ‘looked familiar’. Pellista thought she recognized Tommy and it turned out she grew up on the same area of Darnley Island as his uncle. Pellista also had a nephew, Lorenzo, who was enrolled in the programme, and at one point, a mother and a daughter were enrolled together as well. Michelle told me how she had found out that Jack was her cousin, and indeed, Jack had a lot of cousins who were ‘discovered’ in the studio including Ian and Allan. Charlie, Tommy and Eddie Sam all had connections to Darnley Island and called each other cousins as well. Although the school year started out with no one really knowing each other, by the end of the year, there were a lot of people calling each other family. Michelle remarked on this in her interview and was impressed with what she called the connectedness of the studio. In her words, ‘I just found that with this group, we all got a connection. There’s a good connection.’ Any split inside the studio was not based on perceived ethnicity. Most comments about tensions inside the studio were based on students’ attitudes towards the programme and feelings about the differences between the ATSI and the mainstream studios. With regard to how students perceived other students’ attitudes, there was a general consensus that some students relied too heavily on TAFE to supply their basic material needs such as pencils, erasers, brushes and paper. As Darren points out: I think the students have to pick up their game a bit more. They are expecting too much. Like rocking up and expecting pencils and paper to draw with all the time. I mean that’s … I know the students have to pick up their game more. …

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Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art I’d like to see at least each year at least one artist coming through. We’re going see them go through like CIAF or something. Cause it’s not up to TAFE to produce all these great artists! I mean it’s there. The faculty is there. It’s up to us too instead of going in and just abusing everything. And expecting everything all the time.13

Darren sees the responsibility of becoming a successful artist on the students as well as the TAFE. Investing in their future – by prioritizing the proper materials – and not relying on TAFE to produce artists is his view of how students need to ‘pick up their game’. Material abuse was a problem inside the studio but the poverty of students was also accepted and made allowances for. This was a difficult balance to maintain  – who was suffering financially and who was abusing the system? This situation was further complicated by how the materials were maintained as student fundraising and TAFE funds were both contributing to the existing stock of art supplies. This was a very real issue throughout the field period. Materials were supplied which allowed students to satisfy the criteria put forth in the units. If students wanted to further use the dye baths, brushes or printing presses, they were free to do so but must supply their own dyes, inks, paints, paper and canvas. The blurred line was the unit’s wording which often included phrases such as ‘experimentation’, ‘proficiency’ and one unit even required students to do ‘a series’. Few units specified exact quantities and so students could easily continue producing works in far greater number than the unit was meant to cover. For some students, they produced the bare minimum. For others, there was an endless stream of linoprints, batiks and paintings – all using TAFE materials. This is most clearly illustrated in individual student output. Within the studio, a couple of students produced only four completed works. The average was 15–20 works, with a couple of students producing in excess of 40–50 works. With such a wide range of production output and no real guidelines from the units, material use was all over the board. Other comments regarding the atmosphere of the studio included comparisons between it and the mainstream courses. Tommy critiqued the actual pedagogy itself. He told me: I would like to go to the mainstream because that type of learning is suited to me. Whereas it’s more structured. That’s what I find anyway – I don’t want to put anybody down. I find it’s more structured. What I find here is that you’re given a thing and you sort of go about it on your own.14



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This is an interesting juxtaposition to Darren’s comments. For Darren, students needed to take more responsibility and for Tommy, the instructors had to be more involved. Like Darren’s comment on the use of materials, Tommy’s observation honed in on another very real problem – instructors were mostly absent from the studio for almost the entire time of my field research. Their absence was a problem for the creation of artworks in many ways as will be discussed in subsequent chapters. One of the real problems the studio faced was in discipline when students behaved poorly. In general, the students behaved very well. There was no rough, physical play or abusive language. People were respectful and considerate with each other. During the second half of the year, there was a real problem, with one of the male students making unwanted advances to the female students in the course. These advances were couched in friendly, non-sexual terms but the male student would get too physically close for the female student’s own comfort. This man would enter my own personal space in ways which I found disrespectful and I told him to maintain his distance on several occasions. It was, however, only when other female students began to tell me of their own experiences that I  realized there was a real problem in the studio. I  told the instructor at the time – another man – of what was happening but reaction to fix the problem was slow. Several weeks went by with nothing being done and some of the female students staying home and away from the studio instead of coming to school. This was all to avoid this particular student. In the end, his own bad behaviour solved the problem as he was expelled from the campus after having a physical row with his girlfriend in front of the administration offices.

Thoughts on mainstreaming the course As outlined in Chapter  3, the studio was conceived of as a place to connect with culture and as a place where First Nations culture was at the root of the curriculum and arts practice. Despite many of the shortcomings and difficulties the studio and the students faced during the year, the opposition to the studio being mainstreamed was overwhelmingly uniform but it had little to do with culture. One student, out of the thirteen interviewed, mentioned culture as the strong reason the studio existed. Jack was adamant about the course staying as it was and not being mainstreamed because of the importance of doing cultural arts. In his words:

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Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art It’s very important. It’s very important to know our culture. … It’s very important that we do this course properly and that we do learn from our Traditional Owners or our elders or our teachers who are Indigenous. Yeah. It is very important.15

Jack’s emphasis on the cultural arts was echoed in part by other students but never as strongly as he stated them. Michelle stated that you wouldn’t learn First Nations art in a mainstream course and Lynelle laughed and asked, ‘How can it be Indigenous arts then?’ Clearly, many of the students felt there was a thing to learn called ‘Indigenous arts’. By far, the majority of students enrolled in the ATSI arts course thought the main benefit of the course’s structure was how comfortable the students felt being with other First Nations students. When I asked Charlie how he felt about the course being mainstreamed, he told me it would be ‘bad’. He said, ‘I’m not really sure why but I just know it would be bad.’ Other students were not so hesitant to suggest reasons. Ian expresses how being in an all First Nations studio is a benefit by focusing on a major theme expressed by a lot of students: shame. Shame for First Nations Australians needs to be seen on their terms and in a context beyond a generic definition of the word. Shame is directly connected to one’s sense of self and their sense of worth. For Indigenous peoples, their sense of self is rooted in colonial histories. ‘A sense of self (or identity, character) refers to the awareness of one’s own place in the social world … One develops a sense of self through various experiences, personal or professional in nature or in an academic or social context’ (Louth 2017:  188). Educational environments are particularly difficult. As educator Neil Harrison writes, shame ‘dominates how many Aboriginal children think, talk and behave in the classroom’ and ‘who is looking and listening can dominate learning of Aboriginal students’ (2011: 54). Louth writes ‘a common example of avoidance behaviour is non-participation, as this enables one to dodge embarrassment caused by making a mistake in front of a group of people, or ‘avoiding shame’ (2017: 190). As Louth sums up, ‘for many Indigenous Australians, their behaviour within educational settings is often driven by the motivation to avoid failure rather than seek success’ (ibid.). In Ian’s words: They [Indigenous students] feel more comfortable around their own kind. And can express themselves more. If they are in mainstream they would be too, you know? Like closed off or withdraw themselves from expressing themselves. ‘Cause you know, when you’re in mainstream, you think how can I show, I feel shame. But here with your own kind, you can express yourself more openly. You get more inspired by being around your own kind. You might get good ideas in



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mainstream, like what Annette [the mainstream instructor] does, shit yeah. You can see it in Pellista’s work, Kel’s work, Lynelle’s, Tommy’s. Gain that skills and applying that in traditional format.16

Ian sees the value of studying techniques in the mainstream studio but is quick to suggest an application of those techniques in a traditional format while being surrounded by ‘your own kind.’ Research by Louth confirms the need to carefully craft proper Indigenous educational environments. Louth writes, ‘the question of how to share Indigenous knowledge sensitively and respectfully within local communities needed to be addressed carefully and thoughtfully, in order to avoid shame and increase respect for the local Indigenous people’ (2017: 194). Ian is not the only student to take up the concept of shame. Darren also talked about the pressures of entering into a mainstream programme as a First Nations person. He told me: People are shame or scared to do a mainstream program because they don’t think they’re going to be good enough. They don’t think they are going to be smart enough and stuff so they stay away. That would happen in the arts too if they scrap that. You wouldn’t get all those students there.17

Liz offered up another perspective on the troubles students face when entering any form of schooling. It’s a place where we can all come and we don’t rush, rush. We’re just relaxed and get your painting out there. I don’t even know. It’s like … because them mob in the class, especially if you come straight from the islands or communities, things are too fast for people. When they are in a class like that [the Shed], they [the instructors] can make it more comfortable and make them want to come. But if you come straight from island, into big school, with all these people who know everything and walk around fast pace, it’ll make them want to go into the corner and hide. But in our class we can go at our own pace, don’t laugh at each other, well laugh but not serious. Just little things like that make people comfortable. Cause they can hardly speak proper English. Or they can but they prefer not to. They prefer to use their tongue. So in our class they can whisper to themselves in their language. I think that’s good because then they are not wasting away, throwing their talk away just to get in the classroom. Suppose it should be … if people came from other countries they have to change to English but we should not have to. We come from here. [The mainstream instructor is] over the top. Cause she would be say like ‘oh like do the paint brushes and swirl this’ and they’re probably still thinking ‘swirl? swirl where?’ and she’s already gone past and that makes them not want to show up. Cause they’re shame and all that shit.

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Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art But I reckon if you have patience with them they can produce the most. Because they’re not the same as everybody else, they don’t go with everybody else’s flow. The can produce their own unique style if people have the patience to wait for that to come out of them, I reckon.18

What is of additional interest in all of these three examples is the use of the third person pronoun – they – as a distancing tool for students to speak about the concept of shame. None of the students I interviewed talked personally about their own experiences of shame in a mainstream setting. Lynelle’s declaration of having hated school as a youngster was the closest people came to personalizing the school experience. Liz’s comments come from her depth of understanding of the Torres Strait Islander and Aboriginal students coming from remote areas to the studio. Liz did not come from a remote area – she grew up in Cairns – but she forged a strong friendship with a young woman from Lockhart who did not complete the course and dropped out after the first semester. This experience most likely gave Liz a high level of empathy with situations like this. Regardless of how the students positioned themselves in relation to other students and this issue, the concepts of shame and being comfortable were strong ones. Pellista told me that a lot of First Nations people felt intimidated by white people and that a mainstream course would deny these students the ability to reach their full potential. ‘When it’s just Indigenous people, they feel more comfortable.’ What does it mean to be comfortable then inside the studio? And how does culture enter into and play a role in the study of cultural arts? The studio was a place for First Nations students to not only create works but, in many ways, spend the entire day on campus as well. The Shed had a small section with a refrigerator to keep lunches in and tea-making facilities including a sink, cups, kettle, coffee, sugar and a variety of teas. Tea supplies were stocked by the students who brought milk, coffee and tea in to share with others. There were cupboards with utensils and some dishware on hand as well as mugs for general use. Aside from the use of the kitchen facilities, each student was given a full-size locker to keep their supplies and materials stored and a flat file to keep finished works. Students also gravitated to sections of the shared tables where drawing journals and materials were sometimes left for use the next day. Although everyone was supposed to put all materials away at the end of the day, students would inevitably leave works in progress on the table. This is a very different atmosphere from mainstream studios where the rooms are multipurpose ones and consideration for the next class is paramount. Inside the Shed, the students were the only ones using the space and claiming parts for their own was not actively discouraged or even a detriment to how the studio functioned.



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The use of the room encouraged a type of ownership by the students which helped to facilitate the relaxed and welcoming atmosphere described by the students. One of the key features of the studio, beyond the art supplies and materials, was books. At any one point in the studio, there were over 50 books checked out of the library or on private loan for the students to use. These books included general nature books such as mammals, birds, marine life and National Geographic publications. Other books included ones which were specifically addressing cultural histories and material objects. Popular among these were gallery catalogues and exhibition productions which showcased Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander artworks. For Torres Strait Islanders, two of the most popular reference books were Margaret Lawrie’s Myths and Legends of Torres Strait (1970) and Lindsay Wilson’s Thathilgaw Emeret Lu: A handbook of traditional Torres Strait Islands Material Culture (1988). Lorenzo, a young man from Darnley Island, was just one of many students looking to books as a source of inspiration for his artworks. Such images were sourced in books but talked through in the studio with other students. One of the benefits Leon spoke about with regard to the studio was how helpful it was to have other First Nations students as resources in addition to the books. He told me: I can use the library for starters to get the books. There’s people at the TAFE here who know a bit of things like Tommy. Tommy knows a bit.19

Discussions included language names for objects as some books only referred to objects in one dialect. Other discussions included the permission protocols to paint certain masks and sacred objects. In some cases, it was not a matter of public versus private  – sacred versus profane  – but more about the proper family connections to an object which gave permission to depict the image. Cultural protocols are a major issue for artists coming from the Torres Strait and such issues were being negotiated within the studio. Having other students as resources in the studio was helpful for navigating these tricky questions. Doing these complex explorations into cultural protocols inside a safe space such as the Shed made these endeavours easier to undertake. Admitting to a non-Indigenous audience one lacked cultural information was a huge source of shame and was ideally done in such safe spaces. The studio was seen as more than a space to study and produce art. It was a place which could be moulded and created in the students’ own image and be what they needed and wanted. There was no apologizing or strange looks from other people for speaking in language and accessing books on First Nations culture was

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done without shame. Further, the First Nations studio was a place in which the difficulties of life were taken into account and allowances made for private affairs which affected students’ performance inside the studio. Students were required to be in the studio by 9:00 am, but students with family obligations – helping to get nephews or children off to school – as well as living far away from campus and on difficult bus routes were given allowances and allowed to be tardy. To prevent students from having to repay Abstudy funding, attendance had to be every day without exception. However, this was a problematic requirement. One student’s brother was routinely beating her children while she was in school. She had to leave the programme for several weeks until she could get funding for proper day care. She was accepted back into the programme without question. Another student went on an alcoholic binge for three months. He returned and was welcomed back without judgement. Another student was beaten up in a brawl and did not show up for a week in order for his facial wounds to heal. Mothers left the course early in order to pick up their children from school. There were many ways in which the studio accommodated for the sometimes tumultuous lives of the students. As Liz remarked, the lack of ‘rushing’ in the studio created an atmosphere where life could happen and the rigid protocols of the TAFE institution could be stretched to accommodate for those instances. There was indeed comfort in being away from the perceived critical gaze of a mainstream environment, but the price for the acceptance and comfort of the ATSI studio was an ATSI aesthetic as subsequent chapters will explore and illustrate. The studio was a contained place in that it was a place that 1) had a concept of ‘Indigenous art’ and 2)  had a purpose to produce ‘Indigenous art’. Students, instructors and visitors came into the studio with their own ideas of what ‘Indigenous art’ was while students were being put forward as ‘Indigenous artists’. This chapter explored some of the ways in which the studio changed since its inception in the 1980s. The energy and investment of funds which characterized the 1990s and early 2000s have significantly waned and much of the structure which existed over 20 years ago is now absent. The studio I studied was a place of major transition and uncertainty but it was also conceived of as a completely different space than it had originally been thought of. Major changes such as students studying in the mainstream studio as well as the ‘loss’ of programmes which had currently held a special place as First Nations only contributed to a sense of ‘us’ against ‘them’. This division was further exacerbated by the events which took place between the first and second semester. Under pressures from the State government and



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an increase in budgeting constraints, TAFE rolled out a number of voluntary redundancy packages across campus. One of those redundancy packages was offered to Elaine. Feeling betrayed and unwanted and that her long battle to keep the programme from being mainstreamed was finally coming to an unfortunate close, Elaine took the redundancy. Her replacement was an Australian arts instructor with a heritage from Papua New Guinea. He had experience teaching in remote Aboriginal art centres and was considered a good choice to replace Elaine but disappointment reigned that he was not of Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander descent. Elaine’s departure was characterized by the students as her having been ‘booted out’ of the programme. It was a devastating blow to the studio and, needless to say, further ignited talk about ‘losing’ the programme and having it mainstreamed.

Notes 1 Personal communication, 29 October 2010. 2 Personal communication, 31 August 2010. 3 Curiously, this is the only restriction that was placed on me with regard to talking about artistic protocols. Most of the time, processes and information were shared freely with the hopes of educating ‘people in Canberra’. 4 Personal communication, 29 October 2010. 5 Department of Human Services (2016). https://www.humanservices.gov.au/ corporate/about-us (accessed 25 June 2017). Last updated 8 December 2016. 6 Personal communication, 29 October 2010. 7 Personal communication, 7 April 2010. 8 CDEP (Community Development Employment Projects) is a type of work for the dole programme encouraging Indigenous employment. See Sanders (1993) and Gray et al. (2013). 9 Personal communication, 14 October 2010. 10 Personal communication, 5 November 2010. 11 Personal communication, 2 September 2010. 12 Personal communication, 29 October 2010. 13 Personal communication, 2 September 2010. 14 Personal communication, 7 April 2010. 15 Personal communication, 21 June 2010. 16 Personal communication, 14 October 2010. 17 Personal communication, 2 September 2010. 18 Personal communication, 29 October 2010. 19 Personal communication, 3 April 2010.

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5

Disciplining the artist

Preconceived notions about what it means to be a First Nations artist are embedded within the curriculum at TAFE from its inception. These preconceived notions represent aspects of the curriculum’s use of culture and its consequences in the studio. How notions of culture  – both high culture and the culture of the everyday  – play out in today’s studio environment is at the heart of this chapter. The term ‘culture’ is used uncritically inside the studio as the popular perspective of culture – ‘high’ culture – has been internalized. Across almost all the students and staff of the TAFE arts course, culture is used as a way of defining one’s heritage through specific forms of material objects, stories/legends/myths, dance and, most especially, language. ‘Cultural content’ is a phrase used in the studio to describe those aspects of the curriculum which focus on First Nations lifeways such as language, family history, clan identification, totems, myths and legends and ceremonial processes. Furthermore, most of these aspects of cultural content are thought of as pre-contact or before colonial change altered people’s traditional practices. What will be demonstrated are people’s popular definitions of not only the cultural but also the traditional and the problems which arise from these assumptions. There are two aspects of the studio which will be explored in this chapter: the curriculum as seen through its wording (as presented to and read by the students) and the pedagogy or the delivery of the curriculum by the instructors to the students. The wording of the curriculum will be explored through the two units which focus on First Nations identity against the understanding of the rest of the units delivered throughout the year. Student responses to the curriculum, both verbally and through their works, will be examined. The second portion of this chapter will focus on the pedagogy through a comparison of two studios – the mainstream and ATSI studios  – in which First Nations students were involved. This comparison includes the different colour theories used in order to demonstrate how students view ‘First Nations’ art and how instructors teach First Nations students.

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Curriculum analysis The curriculum of the 2010 studio is substantially different than the one envisioned by planners in the early 1990s. It is much reduced in variety but the focus on ‘culture’ remains. There are a number of units which all the first year students in the ATSI studio must undergo. Regardless if you enter the studio at the Certificate III or Certificate IV level, students will complete the same basic units. There are many units which are available but, because of a lack of instructors, are not always on offer; examples of these include courses such as jewellery making, three-dimensional work, wood carving and ceramic wheel throwing. Examples of some of the units offered and their wording during the 2010 fieldwork period are as follows: ●●

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Develop understanding [of] Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander identity Develop and apply knowledge of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander cultural arts Conduct arts practice which respects Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander heritage Develop, refine and communicate concept for own work Develop self as artist Work with others Apply techniques to produce: ceramics, digital images, painting, printing and textiles

There are basically two types of units: professional development units and arts practice units. There is a rich amount of material in the descriptions found in these units. The practical units – ‘apply techniques’ – are the most straightforward units with a clear objective of learning the methods behind the mediums such as printmaking, painting, ceramics or textiles. For example, in the textile unit, the handout given to students set up three main areas of learning:  resources, techniques and production. With regard to resources and techniques, students were given a lecture by the instructor and a demonstration of the techniques involved. The lectures, when given by Elaine, were about 30 minutes long and were in tandem with demonstrations. The production section of the textile unit is with no references to First Nations practices, culture or protocols. A content analysis of all the practical units within the ATSI curriculum shows that these units are particularly ‘neutral’ in their cultural content – they could be used in



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either the mainstream or ATSI studio and no one would be aware their origin was within the ATSI department. These units are about the manual ability of students to perform the tasks. The very first unit Certificate III and IV students in 2010 were assigned is the ‘Develop understanding [of] Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander identity’ unit. This unit had three parts to it as below. The students had to: 1. List a number of people to access information regarding their place – country, region, protocols, secret information, family kinship. 2. Provide information regarding their family region/country/place by providing evidence through one to three sources (e.g. Letter, Books, Library, Archives, Oral information). 3a. Use any of the art medium the student has learnt and construct a visual composition of a portion of information collected of their family history and/or country. 3b. Present orally about the work created in 3a. OR 3c. Write a thousand-word essay that culturally expresses their identity and relationship to kinship and country. The wording has obvious references to a specific form of First Nations culture such as country, protocols, kinship and the emphasis on understanding copyright (an obvious blow-over from TAFE’s earlier history and the legacy of QAC). There is also an option to focus on ‘family history and/or country’ in the production of an artwork. It is a normal part of any arts programme for artists to develop a sense of artistic self and to be able to communicate that effectively in connection with their artworks. The emphasis on country and family as expressed in this unit is unique though and a part of the ATSI art course’s philosophy of restoring and maintaining a particular form of cultural link. The unit on cultural identity was not the only unit with this leaning towards First Nations cultural themes. Another example can be found in ‘Develop and Apply Knowledge of Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander Cultural Arts’. The instructions for this unit are: research information on cultural art in own and other communities, place information in a project book or visual diary, use diagrams, maps, photos, coloured pencils or paint, demonstrate correct filing and documentation of data.

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The first thing that seems striking is the unit’s phrase ‘cultural arts’. It is one which the course never overtly defines but which is implicitly understood and subsequently internalized by students. In some ways, it is a strange phrase: when have arts not been cultural? No one would argue that a Monet or a Picasso is lacking in culture. ‘Cultural arts’ in the studio takes on a specific meaning however and is heavily defined by the words around the concept even if the concept itself is used uncritically. Additionally, there is an emphasis on one’s own culture versus someone else’s culture. This requires the student to identify with not only a community as ‘theirs’ but also a community with a particular cultural arts tradition. For people growing up in Cairns, claiming a particular community when all they know is ‘Aboriginal’ or ‘Islander’ is highly problematic. After completing the above steps, students then had to answer the following questions (either orally or in writing): ●●

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How did you approach the elders of a community regarding cultural arts information? Explain the structure of cultural arts in three communities of your choice. How have/will you incorporate the knowledge you have gained in your research to your own artwork?

This unit created a problem when people tried to figure out their ‘community’. There were quite a few students who were born and grew up in Cairns. How far back into their family’s heritage did they have to go in order to find their ‘community’? Which parent  – mother or father  – did they follow back in time? The assumptions in this unit are enormous and there were students who struggled and found themselves ‘less’ because of it. One student actually carried a piece of paper in his wallet which included a handwritten description of his heritage including the language name for his island and his totems on both his father’s and mother’s sides. He was over 50  years old, grew up and spent his whole life in Cairns and had never been to the islands. He was at the TAFE as part of a work placement programme and was certainly not prepared for what the art course was asking. Reactions to the curriculum’s content were twofold:  either students calmly accepted the assignment, interpreting it in their own way, or students struggled with the requirements and resented aspects of them which demanded an expression of Indigeneity which rivalled their own conceptions. Two examples of each reaction illustrate some of the views students had in relation to contemporary First Nations art and conceptions of self.



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Ian is a digital artist completing his final diploma year at the TAFE in 2010. He identifies as a Yidinji man from the clan-group Wanyurr-Majay/Madyjandyji or Lower Coastal Yidinji. He describes his artwork as focusing on: The ‘Now Time’ more so than the ‘Dream Time’, whereby one’s artwork are Primarily Influenced by ‘Contemporary’ Styles … but with Strong Secondary Aspects of Cultural influences.1

For Ian, cultural influences are still present but are described as a ‘secondary aspect’ of the total process of artistic design. Ian does not want to be confined to a single time period or stuck in some outsider’s conception of Aboriginality. In his digital work for the course ‘Develop understanding [of] Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander identity’, Ian explores his heritage and expresses his sense of self within the work Identity (Figure 6). According to Ian, the Yidinji have a strong connection to the scrub hen and indeed it has reached iconic proportions in its role as a cultural symbol and marker across the Cairns region. The scrub hen’s triangle head and triangle nest are popularly interpreted as the geological formation of Mt Walsh or the Pyramid, just south of Cairns near Gordonvale. The simple form of the triangle becomes laden with cultural symbolism throughout Ian’s work. This piece, Ian says, ‘is a simple commercial representation symbolising unity’2 and much of Ian’s professional goals are aimed towards the commercial aspects of art production. The scrub hen story is a common story among the Yidinji and her presence within the triangle calls attention to that significance. The white cockatoo is Ian’s personal totem while the clan symbol of the scorpion is symbolized through both its pincers and tail and within the shield design itself.3 The entire entourage of motifs are set against and within an abstracted Aboriginal flag. This image speaks on national, tribal, clan and personal levels. The way that Ian presents and talks about his work – the Nowtime rather than the Dreamtime  – links those traditional aspects of Aboriginal identity to the present. Another example of an artist embracing the identity unit’s principles is Allan who also identifies as Yidinji. His heritage includes a maternal great-greatgrandfather from Vanuatu and Allan has incorporated this mixed lineage into his artwork. The hand-coloured linoprint, entitled Cultural Identity:  Totems (Figure 7), reflects his mixed background and symbolizes many aspects of his heritage. Like Ian, Allan also utilizes the triangle, scorpion and scrub hen motifs as expressions of his Yidinji identity. In addition, these symbols cut across the

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Aboriginal flag, further emphasizing his Aboriginal affiliation. The Aboriginal flag in turn complements and balances the flag of Vanuatu within the bottom register of the picture plane. Along the edges of the print are totems associated with both cultures. Flanking the Vanuatu flag are totemic drums, traditionally carved out of palm trees, now carved into lino. The white cockatoo is also present along with the sea eagle on either side of the Aboriginal flag. Allan’s father is from the Kuku Yidinji tribe of the Daintree/Mossman region and for this aspect of his heritage, Allan has added a cassowary and crocodile. Although Ian and Allan both identify as Yidinji, their artistic expressions are radically different. For Ian, the assignment on identity was seen as an avenue to speak about the many different clans within the Yidinji nation and how they could be reconciled visually as a unified whole. For Allan, it was a way to tell a more personal story about how his South Sea Islander heritage informs on his everyday sense of self. Additionally, both artists discovered their own relatedness as Ian’s mother is Allan’s mother’s sister. These are important social relationships to develop as an artist and the exercise on identity, far from being narrowly defined and structured, actually opens up conversations and trajectories for artistic growth. On the other side of this coin are those students who felt pressurized from the unit’s requirements and were not able to respond to it in the same way as Ian and Allan. The two examples to be examined come from two women in the course but it should not be assumed that this was a particularly gendered response. What is interesting is that these two artists both responded well to the new instructor Richard’s presence in the studio during the second semester. At one point, Richard told both women that ‘I don’t want to know how black you are. I just want to see what kind of art you can do.’ This resonated with them as it spoke to an aspect of the course’s curriculum with which they had both struggled. Pellista is a mature-aged student who is a single mother with seven children between the ages of 7 and 22 years. Her heritage is from the Torres Strait with a father from Darnley Island and a mother from Mabuiag Island. Pellista was born on Darnley Island but her father had to move his family to the mainland for work. Pellista’s mother was of mixed heritage  – Torres Strait and Rotuma Islands – and was not considered of Torres Strait descent but of ‘south sea people’. Pellista’s mother rejected Torres Strait culture and language because she herself was never accepted as such. In turn, she kept her children away from Torres Strait culture as well. Pellista came to the TAFE to study design and when the administrators asked her what her heritage was, they put her into the ATSI arts programme.



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Previously, Pellista had taken business courses at TAFE through the mainstream programmes and had expected the arts programme to be mainstreamed as well. She was not specifically looking for a First Nations arts programme but the administrators put her into the programme when they found out she was Torres Strait Islander. Pellista was not prepared for the units on identity and found them very difficult. In her own words: I think it’s because of the students who have gone past. They Just thought that this [Indigenous identity] is what it’s all about, this is where it’s [the arts course] going. But after talking to Richard … I was really encouraged by some of the things he said by helping me to see. [Be]cause I  was like blocked when they said ‘Indigenous art’. Because I  thought ‘I don’t know anything about clan.’ Everybody’s talking about clan. Everybody knows what clan they came from what animal is the image of the clan and all that stuff. And it’s more like they are focusing on the history of Torres Strait rather than the personal thing.4

Pellista points out the representation of Torres Strait identity over personal identity. The wording in the unit, although not specifically about clan, was interpreted by the majority of the students as clan affiliation, language and totems. This in turn was taken as a call to express a specific and ‘authentic’ artistic representation. I see ‘authentic’ working in the studio as a way of painting or producing artwork which can be easily seen by outsiders as Islander or Aboriginal. For students who were not exposed to things like language, ceremonies or dance, who had family members who refused to talk about these aspects of culture or for those whose religious beliefs turned them off such aspects as totems, the unit was a difficult one to navigate. I never got to see Pellista’s image for the identity course. It was not something she brought out to show people and it was never exhibited. Instead, Pellista preferred painting and drawing from life and her own personal experience. For example, Pellista’s family returned to Darnley Island to live for a period, and she has fond memories of fishing and combing the beaches with her mother. Her works such as Coral Garden (Figure 8) reflect her lived experiences and it is these types of paintings which she shares with people and chooses to exhibit. Lynelle is a mature-aged Aboriginal woman with family ties to the Hope Vale community. She too is a single mother with seven children between the ages of 7 and 23  years. Lynelle grew up in Cairns but returned to Hope Vale as a teenager when her father moved back in order to obtain support in his fight against alcoholism. Lynelle left Hope Vale after her marriage ended, under pressure to ‘do something’ with her life and out of fear that her children would

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be taken away if she could not provide for them. After years of working the service industries around Cairns, Lynelle came to the TAFE programme because her pastor believed her calling was in an artistic direction and encouraged her to pursue something creative for herself. Lynelle felt a lot of pressure to ‘do Aboriginal works’ and was uneasy about the atmosphere within the studio. In her words: Until Richard came up and said, ‘I don’t want to know how Black you are, I just want to know if you can do art. If you can paint or if you can draw.’ And that was such a release. It was literally a release off our [Pellista and mine] shoulders. Yeah, yeah. Looking at all the others, you now, they knew their stories, their totems and what not. And it’s like, ‘totem, okay? Mmmm …’ I was like why are you identifying yourself with an animal?! Yeah. Anyway, that’s just my … that’s the way I look at it. I’m quite happy letting them do what they’re doing.5

Both Pellista and Lynelle felt they could not fulfil the unit’s requirements because they could not identify clan names and totems associated with those clans or legends and myths. They both felt relieved when Richard told them they did not have to prove their ‘blackness’ because their ideas of what it meant to be First Nations within an arts programme were different than what they read in the course. Throughout both of these women’s ­examples  – and including the examples of Ian and Allan – other aspects of First Nations life in Queensland were ignored and aspects of high culture were the focus. Ignored aspects of culture include ways of relating to each other and the value of family and heritage in general; conversations about fishing, bush foods and the lively arguments over the best way to cook damper which had coloured much of the discussions during tea breaks. The wording of the unit on identity forced students into a particular form of Indigeneity which fit comfortably with some and uncomfortably with others. The units did not allow for a sense of self which was rooted outside the preconceived understandings of Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander as implied in the curriculum. In Lynelle painting Seeds (Figure 9), she represents a wellknown parable from the Bible regarding the nature of faith and the Kingdom of Heaven as a mustard seed which starts small and grows tall.6 For an admitted born again Christian, Lynelle sees herself as a woman and Christian first before her identity as an Aboriginal and this painting is the result of that belief. The curriculum used inside the ATSI studio has many aspects which create stress and undermines students’ beliefs about themselves. It led to many students wanting to be identified as ‘just an artist’ and not an Aboriginal or First Nations artist. Further, it is not until the students reach the diploma stage at



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TAFE that alternative avenues into the First Nations arts industry are explored. These avenues include curatorship, exhibiting and business development units. The delay in introducing these aspects of the industry – and regulating them to only a unit or two – creates the impression that being an artist is the only way to have a successful career in First Nations art. It creates a very limited way of being an artist as well as a First Nations artist. Further, the wording of the units emphasizes a particular form of First Nations art based on knowledge of clans, languages, totems and mythologies. The curriculum’s wording however was not the only factor in this process as the delivery of the units contributed as well.

Pedagogy: A tale of two studios and three approaches Elaine did not dictate content directly. The students all spoke positively about her and regretted the fact that she had so much computer work to do. Elaine felt terrible and would tell me how much she just wanted to be inside the studio. She felt that she was not giving the students the quality teaching time they deserved and resented the workload that took her away from the students. ‘We don’t want to do all this theory stuff – We just want to do art!’ she would lament. She wished there were more teachers for the department and hated the fact she was always away. When Elaine was offered the redundancy package and the new instructor Richard took over the studio during the second half of the year, another unit on painting was offered. The result was that during the 2010 year, when resources and time were financially stretched, students undertook the same painting unit twice. Many student balked at this and resisted attempts at having to re-do the unit. Reactions to this will be discussed shortly as these two approaches to studio painting will be the basis for the pedagogical comparison.

Brief overview of classic colour theory The mainstream studio used a biased colour wheel while the new instructor to the ATSI studio used a colour wheel based on Bauhaus teachings. Much of the terminology is the same within these two approaches and it is helpful to have a brief summary of classic colour theory in order to understand the differences between these two approaches. All colour mixing is subjective and palettes are based on personal preference, but classically, the basis for all colour mixing is from a colour wheel. Firstly, there are three primary colours (hues) from which all subsequent colours are drawn from; these colours cannot be mixed with

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other colours and they are red, yellow and blue. Secondary colours are created when two primaries are mixed together; they include orange, green and violet.7 For example, red and yellow make orange; yellow and blue make green; and blue and red make violet. If the ratios between the two primaries are equal, then a true secondary colour results. When the ratios are unequal, the results include a huge range of tertiary colours such as yellowish greens, reddish oranges, bluish violets, greenish blues and so on. There are thousands upon thousands of tertiary colours. Complementary colours  – colours opposite the colour wheel  – are paired as follows: red/green, yellow/violet, blue/orange. When mixed together, complementary colours result in greyish browns. When all three primaries are mixed in equal measure, the result is a muddy black. When black is added to a hue, the result is a shade of that hue. When white is added to a hue, the result is a tint of that hue. There are many points of debate in the above description of the classic colour wheel but they are beyond the scope of this chapter to go into in any depth. There are just as many approaches to colour mixing and palette choice as there are to any method in any field of study – the colours an artist chooses are based on personal taste. These choices create differences in the end product as does choices of canvas or paper and are in many cases influenced by cost and availability. The above gives a basic description of what is needed to understand the following discussion on the approaches taken between the two studios. The use of the term ‘abstraction’ in the studios was very different and was never really defined in either lesson. According to Oxford Art Online, the term is used ‘in general for processes of imagemaking [sic] in which only some of the visual elements usually ascribed to “the natural world” are extracted (i.e. “to abstract”), and also for the description of certain works that fall only partially, if at all, into what is commonly understood to be representational’ (Goodman 2007–12 [online]). Simply put, abstraction is a means of representing something and not the commonly held belief of an abstract painting as one which is nonrepresentational or just a ‘bunch of squiggly lines’. Even in the case of desert painting, abstraction is of traditional Dreamtime imagery even though it is usually beyond the layman to interpret what exactly is being abstracted. As both John Carty and Chrischona Schmidt demonstrate in their theses on Aboriginal art in the Northern Territory, there are many elements which might first be viewed as non-representational but which are abstracted elements of bush tucker, sacred sites and desert fauna (2011, 2012). This is not the case in the ATSI studio in Cairns as the knowledge required for these levels of abstraction is not



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available nor are they part of what could be interpreted as a traditional practice in the region. More of this will be discussed in subsequent chapters.

Mainstream colour theory The colour theory used by the mainstream instructor, Annette, was based on the Wilcox School of Colour and Design. This theory is based on Michael Wilcox’s book Blue and Yellow Don’t Make Green (1987) which proposed a radical rethinking of the colour wheel from the classical perspectives as already described. The Wilcox School proposes four tenets of colour mixing: Pure primary colours do not exist Every red is either a violet-red or an orange-red Blues are either violet-blue or green-blue All yellows have to be either green-yellow or orange-yellow (1987: 38)

The fundamental principle underlying these tenets is that there is no such thing as a ‘pure’ yellow, red or blue. This means that all colours are biased towards one end of the colour spectrum or the other. This is not a radical concept in and of itself. One can see in the natural world the huge range of blues possible which are not simply tints or shades. Wilcox illustrates the effects of these biases when some primaries were mixed and the result created muddy secondaries. The radical thinking Wilcox brings is applying an understanding of colour bias to colour mixing. The palette choice Annette used in the studio consisted of six colours plus titanium white and was based on Wilcox’s principles. No black was used or offered in the mainstream studio. The six colours are cadmium red light (bias yellow); alizarine (bias blue); cadmium yellow light (bias blue); cadmium yellow medium (bias red); ultramarine (bias red); and pthalo (bias yellow). By using two sets of primaries  – one leaning towards either primary  – the artist is able to manipulate and control the secondaries in a variety of ways. For example, if an artist needs a bright, clean orange, cadmium red light (bias yellow) and cadmium yellow medium (bias red) would provide this colour or an ‘orange on bias’. This orange is ‘on bias’ because both colours chosen ‘lean’ towards each other; because there is no blue or leaning towards blue in either hue, the orange is bright and true. If the orange object was in a cast shadow, a muddier orange would be needed in order to create depth. Traditionally, there are two ways to do this: an artist could use black to create a shade or blue could be added to create a ‘dull’ orange and make it recede against other colours. Using

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the biased colour theory, other oranges can be created which satisfy this need. For example, by mixing cadmium red light (bias yellow) with cadmium yellow light (bias blue), the slight blue in the cadmium yellow light creates a less bright and slightly receding orange. This orange is an ‘orange off-bias by one’. Alizarine (bias blue) and cadmium yellow medium (bias yellow) also create an ‘orange off-bias by one’ but with a slightly different hue. When alizarine (bias blue) and cadmium yellow light (bias blue) are mixed, this creates a muddy orange or an ‘orange off-bias by two’. The reason behind all this technique is quite simple: with only six paints, a wide variety and range of colours are at the disposal of the artist. It is not only an economical approach to colour mixing but the control an artist has in the development of hues is impressive. Add white and black to the palette and an almost limitless range of possibilities can be created. This huge range of hues from a small selection of paints was very attractive to the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander art students who voiced approval on the possibilities. What was less attractive was trying to understand the theories and terminologies behind the bias colour wheel. My place in the mainstream studio was as an assistant. This meant helping set up the easels and supplies, fetching additional materials as needed, and providing feedback and guidance to the students. I observed the first lesson given by Annette to the students on the biased colour system and noted the students’ reactions. Annette is an instructor who believes that no matter how complicated the colour theory system was, it was best to get through the basic principles and get the students painting as soon as possible. She assured the students that once they started practicing the method, they would internalize the bias system. Although this approach was sound, there were a couple of things which did not help the delivery and reception of this lesson. Firstly, none of the students were taking notes during the delivery of the colour theory system. I was the only one in the room taking notes on paper. There were almost thirty students between the mainstream and ATSI contingents – fifteen students each – and they all sat at their easels watching Annette demonstrate colour mixing on a large piece of paper at the front of the studio. She advocated a wet-on-wet technique which meant that colour was never mixed on a palette but on the paper or canvas instead. Annette said that such mixing avoided flat colour and added vibrancy to the painting. At the same time, she was calling out rapidfire colour theory based on the bias system. I earnestly scribbled down what was happening – utterly confused by the process. I had never heard of this type of colour mixing in all the fine arts courses I had ever been enrolled. I later emailed



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my friends who had majored in fine arts and painting and they too had not heard of these techniques. I was out of my depth. The second thing I noted was that Annette delivered her lesson quickly and in the language of colour theory – there were no pauses or hesitations. The phrases ‘off bias by one’ and ‘off bias by two’ were almost comical to those who had never heard them before. She spoke fast, mixed fast and in less than ten minutes told the class to repeat what she had done on their own. All the students sat stunned for a moment but then Annette announced ‘just start mixing each primary together’ and the lesson proceeded. The initial reaction to this colour mixing theory was perplexed looks across the entire studio. I quickly became very familiar with this type of colour mixing as I had to reiterate it to the students over and over again. I heard from both ATSI and mainstream students ‘now which red has the blue?’ or something very similar. Issues would arise when Annette would critique works and suggest that a certain area would need to recede further in order for the proper depth of space to be created. She would suggest to the student ‘use an off-bias by two’ orange, green or violet depending on the students’ choice of colour for their monochromatic lessons. With the case of ATSI students (and with some mainstream students too), this would inevitably lead to me being called over and being asked to translate what Annette had said. I would explain the process again, prompting and encouraging the student in the correct colour choices. Later in the course, I  would still be called over but it was to confirm colour choices rather than explain and at the end of the term, I was no longer needed to either confirm or explain. Unfortunately, there were a handful of ATSI students who were just overwhelmed by Annette’s delivery method and terminology. There were students who panicked and a few students left the studio. These students were typically very young  – late teens or early twenties  – and had lived most of their lives either in remote communities or on the islands. One fellow had only recently moved to Cairns from Darnley Island to attend the TAFE course. Elaine explained to me that for a lot of youths coming in from the bush, the extreme rigour of mainstream courses caused them to retreat into themselves which resulted in absences from class. Some students would tentatively come back and try to participate again. One young fellow returned to Annette’s class after a two-day absence. Annette confronted him by asking, ‘where have you been?’ He was so overwhelmed by the confrontation that he never returned to her course again. Exchanges like these illustrate why the ATSI course was so much more comfortable for students than a mainstream course. Many of the students told

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me about the fear of being shamed and that a lot of students were only able to attend the TAFE course because they felt comfortable being with other First Nations students and the fear of being shamed was absent. Annette’s desire was not to shame the students but to hold them accountable for their absences. In point of fact, most of the absences were a factor of a number of things. Home life was chaotic for a few students. Some students were chronically late due to helping get younger children in their home off to school. Being late to Annette’s course  – walking in and hearing ‘off bias by two’ being bantered about – was intimidating. Some students simply stayed away on the days the ATSI students were at Annette’s class to smoke marijuana or hang out at the nearby chip shop. Days like these did nothing for their self-esteem or help promote good school attendance. A majority of students however stuck with Annette’s painting course and produced some very impressive results. Once the students had some colour mixing prowess, they were given a series of successively harder exercises to master. From creating a simple colour wheel to painting spheres grounded in space, the students proceeded along the unit, and for the most part, students were impressed with these lessons. They were given objects to render on paper and they took pride in their abilities to make things come alive before their eyes. Peter, a mature-aged student, produced exquisite works (Figure 10) in Annette’s studio grasping the essence of the colour bias theory even as he laughed when I asked if he could explain it. Exercises which required the painting of objects – even objects with tricky shading and proportions – were accepted and enjoyed. The colour theory remained a source of confusion for a long time, but in general, it was not considered too problematic. Painting in the ATSI studio was radically different. On 14 July 2010, the new instructor Richard delivered his major painting lesson to the students. The delivery was marked by three key aspects: the particular language used by the instructor in relating himself to the students, the emphasis on the market and the new colour theory employed. These three aspects are in stark contrast to the mainstream studio and reveal both the theoretical underpinnings of the new instructor and how he views First Nations art and its marketability. However, as will become apparent, student reaction to this approach to painting is as diverse as the reaction to the mainstream’s approach to painting. These reactions, like before, are rooted in concepts of self, Indigeneity and personal expectations about what constitutes art, let alone First Nations art. Firstly, the language Richard used was based on an inclusivity which may or may not be acceptable to the students and staff at the TAFE. For example,



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Richard stated at one point in his address ‘our people here’. This phrase is deliberately vague enough in order to be interpreted in a variety of ways. On one hand, ‘our people’ could be interpreted as Richard making himself out as a First Nations – Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander – person. This interpretation is further reinforced by Richard’s referral of some students through classificatory Aboriginal kinship terms such as cousin, sister or brother and referring to Elaine as ‘Aunty’. If pressed on his heritage though, the phrase is vague enough for Richard to claim he was merely implying a relationship between black Australians. These two interpretations were not lost on students. Although most accepted Richard as black in much the same way as I was accepted as native, some students felt that his use of kinship terms was inappropriate. Elaine felt that being called Aunty in front of her students was demeaning and undermined her authority as a teacher. She felt the term was ‘unprofessional’ and encouraged students to avoid calling her Aunty, although she admitted that with the Islander students, it was hard to break them of that habit and she had given up correcting them. Other students just shrugged their shoulders in a common ‘what can you do?’ reaction to the issue while some other students felt it just was not an issue at all. One student furrowed her eyebrows at the use of kinship terms. Although there were a lot of people in the studio who were related and people frequently used kinship terms with each other, few felt comfortable with Richard stepping into the studio and using those terms on his first week on the job. Coupled with the use of this kind of language is the way Richard introduced the unit through a detailed discussion of how the market works, exampled in his experiences in a remote Cape York art centre. An important note of terminology change happened once again in this instance. Richard referred to the process of creating art as ‘the industry’ such as ‘when painting for the industry, you must’ and ‘the industry typically does’. This validated what he said in many ways and created an atmosphere which many students perceived as ‘professional’ and ‘business-like’. Richard explored many themes and aspects which he felt were the most important for students to understand. An example includes the types of materials which are used. Richard advocates for the use of Matisse paints because of their thick ‘creamy’ quality which, unlike cheaper paints, have less viscosity and are more opaque. Richard attributes these qualities of Matisse paints to the high quality of paintings which come from Richard’s art centre. He went on to explain how other art centres use house paint for longevity but which are not museum and gallery quality  – a thing which should be kept in the forefront of artists’

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minds. Additionally, fine linen for painting should also be used. Both of these recommendations are very expensive when compared to student-grade acrylics and lower grade canvas. Furthermore, Richard talked in depth about the pricing of artworks, casually throwing around $4,000 and $15,000 price tags with artworks by artists who have only practiced a handful of years. Reactions to Richard’s initial lecture varied among the students. Some declared with confidence their goal of selling an artwork for ‘a million dollars’ within two years. Quite a few others were impressed with Richard’s knowledge of the arts industry, declaring ‘Richard really knows the industry.’ Richard clearly established his credentials with talk about expensive materials and high sales – inadvertently linking the success of sales with the types of materials used which made the act of entering the market an almost formulaic process. It also helped that Richard name-dropped the major art centres around Australia such as Lockhart, Papunya Tula, Aurukun, following up with a recap of previous CIAF exhibitions successes. These techniques  – the use of kinship terms, the promotion of expensive materials, the talk of high sales, the name-dropping of high-profile arts centres – all worked to establish Richard as a well-connected and knowledgeable instructor in the eyes of some of the students. After talking for a period of time, Richard began his unit on painting which was designed to ‘strip back’ everything the students thought they knew about painting and build up a ‘new understanding’. When I  first met Richard three months previously, I had asked him about his remote art centre experience. He told me he practiced a form of ‘cultural diffusionist ideology’ using Bauhaus colour theory. Richard defines Bauhaus as using only primary colours  – red, blue and yellow  – plus white and black to create a full palette. As far as cultural diffusionist ideology goes, Richard does not see a limit to one’s creative inspiration. He acknowledges cultural protocols – one must not copy another’s legend or story  – but given the region that he worked in represents so many multi-cultural influences, Richard focuses on ‘the art of painting’ and the basics of art making more than ‘who owns a line or a dot’. The importance for Richard is the application of the materials and the craftsmanship of the painting.8 In point of fact, Bauhaus colour theory is the direct opposite of the Wilcox model. According to Johannes Itten, one of the foundational arts instructors at the Bauhaus school from 1919 to 1933, ‘yellow must not tend towards yellow-green nor towards orange, blue must not tend towards blue-green nor towards bluered, red must not tend towards red-orange nor towards red-blue’ (Itten 1975: 32). Richard did not go into a lot of detail regarding Bauhaus colour theory – in fact he did not mention that was what he was teaching at all. He did place his



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colour theory in direct contrast though to what the mainstream studio had taught the students. His tone and mannerism suggested a slight contempt towards the previous studio’s approach to colour theory – a slight eye roll, a small smirk and the placing of his colour approach as the process in the First Nations art industry all provided the foundation of negating the previous method in favour of what he was promoting. Richard did not contextualize his colour theory but then neither did Annette. Both examples were presented as the way of mixing colour and not as a theoretical approach or one of many different potential approaches. After a brief lesson on mixing colour and introducing monochromatic palettes, Richard began his major lesson in painting. Some students were confused as they had had an entire semester with Annette learning her style of painting. Some students remarked ‘we’ve already done the painting unit’. Elaine was confused as well because there were many more units to be delivered in order for students to graduate from the programme and to satisfy the needs of the administration for ‘delivery hours’. Why waste time and materials duplicating lessons? I suspect that Richard was using the unit as a way of establishing his credibility and taking ownership of the studio when the atmosphere was still heavily biased towards Elaine. On top of that, he was the first black man to convene the programme, and he was non-Indigenous: the pressure to do well would have been understandable. He did have a different way of doing things. As will become apparent, there were many aspects of Richard’s painting lesson which are different from the mainstream lesson. One of the most obvious differences was that the painting lesson Richard developed was the most regimented lesson ever delivered throughout the entire year. Step 1: The painting exercise began with the instructor asking the students to pick a background colour based on a primary colour (blue, yellow or red). Step 2: Once the canvas was handed out, students were to cover the entire area with the background colour. Step 3: As the background colour was drying, students were then instructed to mix the secondary colour (orange, purple or green). Step 4: The next step was to dry-brush the oranges (‘pure’, tints and shades) across the dried background. Dry-brushing is a technique where a minimum amount of paint is put on a brush and then lightly brushed across the canvas. The technique can create a range of effects depending on how one drags the brush over the surface of the canvas. The instructor told the students to use ‘gestural strokes’ which are broad, sweeping

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gestures which include a full range of arm movement. This produced a lot of streaking across the canvas. Step 5: The next step was to block out ‘positive’ and ‘negative’ spaces with black paint. Step 6: After the black areas were applied, the students were then instructed to mix three greys: dark, medium and light. Step 7: The final step in the painting exercise was to ‘add lines of colour’ using each grey inside the blacked out areas. This was demonstrated on a white board as infill designs such as parallel lines or concentric circles. There is no doubt that Bauhaus colour theory is about shapes (Kandinsky 1914; Itten 1961, 1963) but critically in Bauhaus theory, the shapes are very specific and have an emotion and colour association with them. The three main Bauhaus shapes are: circles, squares and (the most important shape) triangles. Circles are typically associated with blue, squares with red and triangles with yellow (Itten 1963). In Richards’s demonstration of adding lines within the blacked out areas, squares and triangles do not appear – only half circles and lines. In point of fact, it is very difficult to look at Richard’s demonstration of infilling without recognizing the ‘Aboriginality’ of what he is proposing. Student reactions to the Bauhaus exercise were varied. Some students followed the instructions to the letter while others ignored the grey palettes and incorporated bright yellows, golds and reds. Others questioned the new techniques, becoming confused with what had previously been taught in the mainstream studio. ‘I thought dry-brushing was for blending’, one student remarked, unsure about how dry-brushing across the blue was an acceptable form of painting. At the end of the lesson, he requested to return to the mainstream studio to continue to learn how to paint ‘for real’. One artist declared the painting a rubbish one as it was not ‘real painting, like Annette’s class’. In point of fact, this was an incredibly regimented exercise and the results reflect this process (Figure 11). At one point, one of the students turned to me and said, ‘This looks like central desert painting to me. I hope we don’t break copyright.’ He then laughed and said, ‘King Billy coke bottle art! It’s not my style but this is exactly what I came here to learn. It is central desert art though.’ I asked him how he would make it his style. ‘Oh change the colour. Don’t use greys but yellows and blacks instead but this is central desert art.’ Other students were pleased with their results. One said, the process was ‘A lot more professional and gives you perspective on what to do in a painting. Before



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[the lesson] you go, what the hell? Now you know what you’re doing.’ Another student did not like the process and said, ‘It’s not my style. Too abstract-y.’ He looked over his painting and swept his arm over the surface. ‘I’ll call this thing ball bearing casing.’ One student waved me over and gleefully asked me, ‘Wanna hear the Dreamtime story that goes with this painting?’ before breaking out into laughter, clearly making fun of both my position in the studio and having a story for what he would later call a ‘rubbish painting’. The processes of these two different studios highlight some key theoretical positions the studios themselves took with relation to art production. There clearly existed in the minds of the students a concept of ‘Indigenous art’ which was not uniformly conceived of across the studio. The curriculum and the pedagogical practices were not all rejected or all accepted. Richard was much more conscious of First Nations protocols and methods but his approaches were not always acceptable to the students. Annette did little to address or acknowledge the special needs of the students but some students continued to adhere to her painting principles. In response to the two studios, the students were divided. Two different painting techniques were utilized as well as two approaches to art production. Reactions were a hodgepodge of accepting one and rejecting the other. Annette’s paint-mixing techniques were complicated and some students turned away from it, preferring the simpler Bauhaus method taught by Richard. Students who had excelled in Annette’s class kept her paint-mixing techniques as ‘the way real painting is done’. Some students were very opposed to Richard’s method of both paint-mixing (‘rubbish’) and abstraction which seemed like a copy of Central Desert artworks. Other students felt that Richard’s method of abstraction was true ‘Aboriginal’ painting and what they had desired to learn since day one of the school year. In both of these lessons, content was never talked about. As discussed in Chapter 4, there is a pressure felt by students to produced First Nations works and as this chapter shows, the curriculum emphasizes this pressure even more. One of the key misunderstandings about the ‘pressure to do Aboriginal works’ is that this pressure relates to content not style. Returning to Lynelle’s Seeds (Figure 9), the content is said to be Christian, yet the repetition of form, the earth-toned colours, the flatness of colour and the seed shape all reflect a personal, Aboriginal sense of self. This image would not stand out as particularly Christian and yet when it was hung during the end of the year exhibition, it was one of the more popular pieces chosen by visitors and sold fairly quickly as a piece of ‘Aboriginal’ art. Lynelle was fine with producing works in this style but

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for her the content – the conceptual reason for the piece – had to be something important and relevant. Ironically, Richard understood the pressures that the curriculum put on the students. At one point, he told me he wanted to rework the curriculum of the course in order to ‘negate the cultural content’. He wanted to remove all cultural references in the units as he felt it was putting unnecessary pressure on students to find out what their culture was. Elaine’s reaction to this was shock. She told me, ‘He’s a white man, I’m sorry but he’s a white man. When you do that, it opens it up for the mainstream. Who does he think he is? He’s only there for 6 months!’ When I told her he wanted to focus on the technical aspects instead of the cultural ones, she said, ‘we’re already doing what he’s saying but taking our artwork from the culture … I don’t teach culture. I teach techniques. From their culture and their identity – they find [their art]. And from there, they do their artwork.’ Superficially, it might seem that Richard understood the pressures the curriculum put on the students. However, he lacked the knowledge of the history of the TAFE programme which Elaine understood so well, having actually lived it. Her fear was twofold. First, removing of the cultural content would make the ATSI programme the same as the mainstream programme except for the different enrolment criteria. How was this enrolment criteria to be maintained if the cultural content was ‘negated’? Secondly, Elaine was afraid that by breaking down these differences, it would open up the facilities of the ATSI studio for use by the mainstream studio. Once again, the fear of losing the programme was rearing its ugly head. Questionable in all of this are the ‘techniques’ Richard purported which were somehow ‘culturally neutral’ or lacking in cultural content. Although the works produced in his painting unit were content free, they were certainly not free of cultural connotations. The students’ reactions – asking about the breaching of copyright, the assertions that the paintings were of the Central Desert and the ‘dreaming up’ of Dreamtime stories – do not support a culturally neutral lesson focused only on technique. Additionally, some students familiar with Annette’s colour mixing called Richard’s approach ‘rubbish’. There is no doubt that Richard had a point. Students told me about how the curriculum made them feel less and confused about their First Nations identity. It certainly was an issue but it was not an issue for everyone. For many students, there was an ease and enjoyment with the assignments which caused no internal problems or conflicts. Additionally, for those students for whom the curriculum was problematic, they still had a high participation rate and enjoyed their year inside the studio. In fact, those who were most vocal about



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the course’s limitations were generally the most active in fundraisers, exhibitions and student committees which help direct the studio’s activities. Nobody quit the course because of the expectations regarding cultural content. Richard believed that culture was embedded in the units and he wanted to take it out. Elaine told me that no, culture is not embedded in the course. ‘If he knew the history of that place, he would not be saying to “negate culture”. He’s just playing to the white man. He knows about us but he doesn’t know us.’ I have personally struggled with this problem of cultural content and the apparent tension between the student’s experiences and the demands of the curriculum. Elaine has communicated to me time and time again the importance of the cultural aspects of the studio and yet at the same time insists that she is not teaching culture. On one hand, there is a bit of ridiculousness in taking a First Nations cultural concept and inserting it into a Western institution and thinking that it would be an easy fit. If students struggle with these identity concepts brought up by the curriculum, it is because these are difficult issues. Richard’s desire to remove this pressure might seem admirable but it is in ignorance of the history of the TAFE First Nations arts programme and what at its core it is actually aiming to be: a space for First Nations artists. Elaine told me bluntly why culture had to be maintained in the studio. Oh I’ll tell you why. It’s because if you didn’t have anything like that, it wouldn’t be a cultural course. Its name as a cultural course to have culture in there. And one of the main aims is to maintain the culture. Now maintain what? What have we got left? We only have our art left. What other part of culture do we got? Tell me. We got the body language going and the talking and all that but symbolically, what have we got that says we’re urban Aboriginal people? We don’t know.9

Here ultimately is where notions of culture clash. The cultural content of the curriculum keeps the studio as a First Nations space, open only to First Nations students. The sociocultural reality of being an urban First Nations Australian is made up of many factors such as lingo, dress, food, experiences and ways of relating – all of which are ignored not only by the curriculum but by the students and staff as well. Chapter 6 will explore in part how these ‘other’ forms of culture are subsumed beneath forms of high culture as they have been related here (e.g. traditional language, myths, totems and clans), but the debate between negating the cultural content of the curriculum and Elaine’s insistence on not teaching culture should be viewed in the light of the difference between high culture and the everyday aspects of distinct life patterns and ways of being. Elaine did not teach cultural protocols, legends, Aboriginal history or Islander ‘culture’. What

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she was advocating for was a space for those things to come up through the students themselves. The continuation of the ATSI arts programme required cultural content and a defined culture as those material and demonstrable things as known such as language, totems and stories. To define the course through alternative means – to talk about everyday culture versus high culture – would be an enormous headache upon which to base a unique ATSI arts programme. There would be no easy solution.

Notes 1 Personal communication, 1 June 2010. 2 Personal communication, 22 August 2010. 3 Within the traditional shield designs, the triangular notches radiating away from the central diamond within the shield are similar to the notches found on the region’s scorpion’s head. 4 Personal communication, 5 November 2010. 5 Personal communication, 29 October 2010. 6 New King James, Matthew 13:31–32 tells the parable of the mustard seed: ‘The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed, which a man took and sowed in his field, which indeed is the least of all the seeds; but when it is grown it is greater than the herbs and becomes a tree, so that the birds of the air come and nest in its branches.’ 7 Art studios never use the term ‘purple’. 8 As a side note, this engagement is a very different way of providing one’s credentials compared to the previous discussion. By bringing in terms such as ‘diffusionist ideology’ and Bauhaus colour theory, Richard was creating a very different type of authority. 9 Personal communication, 15 June 2010.

6

Value creation and the market

Tommy:  I want to create artwork which educates people about my Torres Strait Islander heritage. Art Dealer:  Don’t worry about that stuff. Just create artwork which is pretty to look at.1

Tommy’s quote illustrates the oftentimes different sets of values artists and nonartists working in the First Nations art market have. As I discovered, value is how artists see their artworks as a tool for communicating their heritage and cultural knowledge. Gallery and art dealers are understandably interested in something which will sell. Whether value is defined as currency or as cultural worthiness, these two different approaches to value within First Nations art can be at odds with each other: There are prescribed ways of ascertaining value which falls in line with both the public’s and the market’s perception of what Aboriginal art is. As Altman notes, ‘since most community-based art centres are in regional and remote Australia, the majority of artists are also located in these regions. This distribution accords with market perceptions that more “traditional” First Nations people live in the more remote regions and that “authentic” First Nations art is produced in these places’ (2002:  7). Although Cairns may be considered a regional area, its art centre is not structured in the same way as the community-based art centres to which Altman refers, and artists from Cairns are at pains to establish their authenticity to potential buyers. The anthropologist Fred Myers heard the phrase ‘dots for dollars’ often while conducting fieldwork among the Pintupi (2002: 217), indicating some level of how artworks were valued by artists’ responses to market success. The philosopher and archaeologist R. G. Collingwood wrote about the differences between ‘good’ art and ‘bad’ art in this way: The definition of any given kind of thing is also the definition of a good thing of that kind: for a thing that is good in its kind is only a thing which possesses

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the attributes of that kind. To call things good and bad is to imply success and failure. (Collingwood [1958] 2003: 536)

Collingwood’s focus on success and failure seems applicable in the case of First Nations art in Australia in that there seems to be a perceived ideal of Aboriginal or First Nations art. If works sell well, then there is a certain level of value attributed to them  – hence Myers’s artists’ declaration of ‘dots for dollars’. However, Myers has taken pains to illustrate the many ways in which knowledge is valued and ‘encoded in the painting[s]‌’ (2002a:  27). Morphy has written volumes on how particular and meticulous forms of cross-hatching create an energetic ‘shimmering’ which is viewed as ancestral presence (Morphy 1991, 2008) giving Yolngu works a form of cultural value. The anthropologist Eric Michaels writes: the creation of value now can come quite late in the production game, to the point of challenging the approved methodologies of materialist analysis. Part of what makes ‘fine art’ particularly attractive to the investment market obviously must be this negotiability of worth based on cultural rather than material calculations. (1994: 143)

This ‘cultural’ worth and definition of value seems to be unique to First Nations arts all over the world as it is what frequently dominates the conversations (Barrow 1978; Morphy 1998; Rushing III 1999). The worthiness of an artwork created inside the TAFE ATSI studio is done in an atmosphere of almost blanket acceptance. This acceptance will be shown to be based on the student’s cultural identity in much the same way as Michaels’s research shows. Writing in the case of the Warlpiri people of Yuendumu, Michaels writes, ‘Everyone in a traditional society is effectively entitled to paint certain designs’ regardless of talent because ‘design traditions are considered to originate in a collective past’ (1994: 144). This does not mean that all forms of art are acceptable or seen as appropriate when students make decisions on what to display in gallery exhibitions. However, the process of creating artworks inside the studio influences student choices in what artworks should be displayed. This process favours artworks which have a strong cultural content and marginalizes works which are outside preconceptions of ‘Indigenous’ art. One student entered the TAFE specifically for improving his painting techniques on the boomerangs and artefacts he sells at outdoor markets but generally, the students had little experience with the arts market. Engaging with the art markets available in the Cairns region or exhibiting in the galleries is a process of a very specific form of value creation.



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As demonstrated in Chapter 5, students have a notion called ‘Indigenous art’, and it is a concept which was shown to have both visual and thematic aspects. Further fuelling students’ notions on First Nations art, art production in Cairns is also found to be determined in part by the market and its demands on the artist. These demands create expectations of authenticity and representation within Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander works. These expectations in turn reflect not only the pricing of artworks but also the imagery and materials – the very construction – of those artworks. Furthermore, these expectations are of a different nature in the Cairns region than they are elsewhere in Australia because of the juxtaposition of a large tourist market next to several well-established fine art galleries. This chapter will explore the First Nations arts market in Cairns and how the market influences value creation. Chapter 3 set up the basis from which we can understand how the history of curio production in Queensland has created a curriculum focused on correct designs, clan identification and an understanding of ‘country’. This chapter will demonstrate how current market trends create a different tension in the studio and the production of First Nations arts and how students respond to these tensions. There are two ways of engaging with the market in Cairns: outdoor markets and exhibitions in galleries. Exhibition opportunities on the TAFE campus include the student galleries such as in the mainstream department and the ATSI gallery, the Banggu Minjaany Arts & Cultural Centre. Off-campus opportunities include the end of year exhibition for diploma students at the Cairns Art Gallery and occasional opportunities at KickArts Contemporary Arts, Canopy Arts Space and c1907 Contemporary Arts Space. The purpose of this section however is not to go through an exhaustive description of the experiences students had with each market and gallery. I want to use this data in order to illustrate how students responded and anticipated their audiences within and between these two market spaces and how these responses reflect back on their sense of self. What only became evident in the last weeks of the field period was that students created very different forms of artwork when they were preparing for the markets or preparing for an exhibition and when they were privately experimenting in their journals. These differences create a fascinating portrait of self-identity and self-representation within First Nations visual arts which is influenced by the market, galleries and practices within the studio. Further, practices in the studio reinforced a highly positive atmosphere towards students’ works in which works are seen as complete and of a high quality. This acceptance of all the works created, and the labelling of most works as ‘deadly’, oriented the students towards their art in ways which encouraged higher pricing as the

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students saw themselves as equal to those of established artists. This acceptance also oriented students towards a specific form of representation. This chapter will first look at how value is created, focusing on how concepts of First Nations autonomy shape the practices in the studio. All artworks inside the studio were seen as equally good – ‘deadly’ – and equally finished. This equality affected the subsequent pricing of the artworks as a reflection of how students valued their works in a wider context. Next, the chapter will look at the market and how success in the markets encouraged a certain form of First Nations art. Finally, the chapter will look at how students evaluated the worthiness of an artwork to be exhibited.

Value creation in the studio Through my own participation in art studios for over 25  years, I  understand critique as a common experience which happens after each exercise. Works are usually put forward in front of the class and students and instructors comment on how ‘successful’ each work is with regard to the established goal of the exercise. This process of critique is implied in Juliette Aristides’s Classical Painting Atelier: A Contemporary Guide to Traditional Studio Practice (2008). For example, Aristides writes that the atelier training ‘features an apprenticeship-like course of study in which students receive intensive mentoring from an artist. In an atelier program the master artist gives each student new information only as he is able to apply it’ (2008: 3–4). These critiques can be quite difficult to take on board as one can be quite emotionally invested in an artwork, but this is the process in most studios I have worked in. In case one thinks that critique in learning artistic traditions is only a Western concept, there is plenty of evidence to suggest that First Nations communities also employ forms of critique which are embedded in taking up cultural painting and mark making. Morphy writes that for the Yolŋu in Eastern Arnhem land, ‘if a particular individual proves unsatisfactory, then his structural position is overridden and the rights and obligations he should have inherited are taken over by another man’ (1991: 64). Luke Taylor demonstrates that in Western Arnhem Land, the Kunwinjku bark painters demand a very precise iconic representation of their fauna and corrections will be made by senior artists (1996:  164–5). These corrections will continue to be made until the artist ‘has mastered the correct iconography for many species’ (Taylor 1996: 16). The atmosphere of the



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TAFE studio is vastly different to these contexts and contributes greatly to the reception of the various levels of critique. Inside the ATSI studio, artworks were created without an instructor present for most of the week. I  was told that Elaine normally liked to go around the studio and give feedback to the students on their progress. Although the paperwork required to keep the studio operational kept Elaine out of the Shed for most of the day, she would make a habit of at least popping in for 10 minutes to go around the classroom and see what the students were doing. These visits were short and infrequent and most of the feedback Elaine provided was positive encouragement. If a student expressed a problem with an area or approach, Elaine would offer more critical views on how to proceed. From what I observed, however, these critiques were rare and they seldom happened. Why was there not more critiquing of student works? Initially, I believe, the lack of critical feedback was because Elaine spent such little time inside the studio and wanted to at least be a positive force in encouraging students to continue their studies. Ultimately, the students were left largely on their own because of the administrative demands on Elaine’s time. When works were in the process of being or when they were finished, they were shown instead to other students who offered feedback. There are two ways in which this feedback worked. The first forms of feedback were comments about artistic techniques. With the instructor absent, more experienced students took her place by demonstrating the techniques required for proficiency of the unit. These interactions were the only time real critique happened in the studio and it only happened at a certain time. For example, when a student was new to linoprinting, more experienced students might point out the thickness or lack of consistency in the cutting or comment on the need to cut deeper, more smoothly or offer advice in the use of an alternative tool. Once the student had produced a lino which was perfectly printed  – no smudged lines, consistent ink across the image and no bleeding of the ink – then no further critique was required or given. Help was asked for and freely given but never offered. Critique in this sense was limited to technical proficiency. No comments on whether the image itself worked  – the artistic ‘vision’ so to speak – were ever made. Once an artwork was completed and put up before other students for commentary, the results were always positive. ‘That’s deadly’ was the most common form of acceptance in an artwork and students would gather around the artist and their work and nod agreement, smile and say ‘good job’, ‘good on ya, mate’ and ‘ah deadly!’ No one did a work which was poor or needed

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adjustment or further work. No one offered up better solutions to an artistic problem or refinement ideas for displays. Additionally, no one commented  – positively or negatively – on the brushwork, shading, use of colour, blending or use of perspective. If a technique was particularly appreciated, it was through comments such as ‘how did you do that?’ or ‘can you show me what you did here?’ Requests for demonstrations were never refused. The second form of feedback was what typically happens in a Western studio – a stylistic as well as technical critique of the work. There was only one instance where this took place inside the studio and the situation in which it arose was a unique one. ‘Jack’2 was a controversial figure in the studio as the source of amusement and fun as well as tension and aggravation. Although infused with an infectious laugh and witty sense of humour, Jack had a turbulent personal life and he frequently wanted to share the frustrations he was experiencing with his girlfriend with anyone who would listen. This was very draining for other students who really just wanted to concentrate on their art. Additionally, Jack himself felt he could do no wrong in his artwork. In a 2009 ceramics course, Jack produced pieces which were received by the other students as well-executed and ‘deadly’. When Jack brought his work to show me, he insisted that he was the best student in the ceramics studio, linking that success to his famous relative, the potter Thancoupie. The pottery instructor, a non-Indigenous Australian woman, explained to me that first year pots should be considered rough pieces compared to results from continued practice and instruction. She explained to me that she tried to get this across to the students but to no avail. Her approach was seen as having an ‘attitude’. This ‘attitude’ of the instructor, as it was relayed to me by the students, was due to the fact that she was jealous of Jack’s skill and ability with ceramics. I heard this not only from Jack but also from other students who had both been with him during the course and those who were simply admirers of his work. Jack was not the only one to feel this way about the ceramics being produced as most students who completed the first year ceramics course felt their works were ‘perfect’. The critique happened when Jack produced a painting of a koala towards the end of the school year. This painting was unique in and of itself because it was the only time someone had depicted a koala in the studio. Koalas are not found in far north Queensland outside of zoos and tourist shops. They are not a part of the students’ normal image repertoire as the content analysis (to be discussed in Chapter 7) will demonstrate. When Jack finally declared his painting finished, the students gathered around it but instead of the usual ‘deadly’ which typically



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followed the presentation of a piece, there was a silence as people pondered what they saw. The koala was done in an x-ray style on a bright red background. X-ray is another style of art that was not common in the Cape York region. Jack executed the x-ray technique with greys, whites, olive greens and brighter reds. The jarring juxtaposition of the greens and reds as well as the veiny red x-ray lines spread out over the white ‘bones’ of the koala produced an incredibly vivid but disturbing image. Finally, the koala’s head is cocked to one side, looking at the viewer through skeletal eyes. The initial reaction was from one Torres Strait Islander woman who said, ‘Oh! He looks so sad.’ An Aboriginal man said, ‘He looks creepy.’ Another Aboriginal woman commented, ‘What is wrong with him? He looks unhappy.’ The first woman said, ‘We paint how we feel inside. What’s wrong Jack? Are you sad?’ The tone of these comments was at once mocking and sincere at the same time. People clearly did not respond well to the koala and indeed, from that day on, the painting was known as ‘that psycho koala’. Jack did not respond well to people’s comments. At first, he muttered, ‘Come on, mate’  – a phrase he said often to get people in line with what he felt was more appropriate behaviour. Then, after the first woman asked him what was wrong, he said in a strong, loud voice, ‘You people don’t know what you’re talking about!’ At that moment he left the studio for the rest of the day. There are two things to note about this particular encounter. The first was the type of critique given by the students which was based on emotional responses to the painting. Jack’s grey and white colouring of the koala’s body along with the red lines overlaying the grey and white made the koala look visceral – like a circulatory system superimposed over a skeleton. The student reactions were to focus on how they felt about the koala – that he was seen as ‘sad’, ‘creepy’ and ‘upset’ – all of which was supported by the painting techniques Jack employed. Jack’s reaction was to leave the studio, angry and claiming people’s ignorance. He did not return until the next day. This sort of reaction might be why there are no such critiques inside the Shed as they happen in a non-Indigenous studio. Jack’s reaction to the critique can be understood through a particularly First Nations perspective of autonomy and relatedness to the other students of the course. As David Martin wrote with regard to the First Nations economic domain, Aboriginal people in his field site claimed that ‘people should be “shoulders together”, not one higher than the other’ (1995: 8). Although Martin was specifically referring to material accumulation, his statement rings true within the studio. I often heard the phrase ‘don’t puff yourself up’ or ‘I don’t want

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to puff myself up’ in regard to evaluating an artwork or a decision to exhibit or go to the market. Additionally, during passionate interviews, participants would back off abruptly and qualify their comments with ‘in my opinion’ or ‘it’s only my opinion’. By critiquing Jack’s painting, students were breaching this etiquette and infringing on Jack’s autonomous self. Jack reacted strongly against this infringement by taking himself out of the studio’s domain, yet clearly invited it upon himself by seeing his works as better than others. The absence of critique within the studio had various affects upon the students and their works. All artwork created in the studio was seen as or at least received as ‘deadly’. Additionally, the acceptance of works oriented the students towards artists outside the studio in specific ways. Established artists such as Alick Tipoti, Dennis Nona, Arone Meeks or Lisa Michl sell their artworks in the galleries and art centres for thousands of dollars. They work in lino, acrylics, metals and screen printing. Comparison between established artists and artists in the studio was common and more often than not, student works were seen as equal in technical execution as those already working in the industry. This equal comparison is facilitated by two factors. First, a lot of the established artists in Cairns came through the TAFE programme. This creates an affinity between current students and past students as they see past students’ successes in the wider marketplace. Second, by seeing each other as equal and equally talented within the studio, it is a small leap to extend this thought process outside the studio. I often heard inside the studio: ‘that lino’s just as good as Alick’s’ or ‘that painting is just as good as Lisa’s’. Works by the students were never better but they were often ‘as good’ as established artists. This perception of equality heavily influenced students’ approaches to pricing their artworks as they tended to want to put professional prices on their works. As described in Chapter  5, Richard’s speech about new artists selling works for millions of dollars added to the TAFE students’ expectations as well. During subsequent returns to the field, I noticed this was a continuing trend. In 2012, during a major arts festival, one first year student had a linoprint for sale in a pop-up gallery for $4,000AUD – an outrageously high price for a student work.

The outdoor markets Engagement with the market typically happened through participation in the outdoor markets. Occasionally, visitors with connections to people who were familiar with the ATSI studio would bring buyers through and sales were made.



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Artwork which sold was artwork which was available – meaning artwork which was finished, dry and not already taken out to be sold elsewhere. Aside from the two or three instances where people came to the studio, there were many outdoor market opportunities available in the Cairns region. Port Douglas has a large weekly Saturday market which caters to tourists and includes vendors of all persuasions. The focus is on the handmade and the local and not imported, commercially produced items, and there is a strict enforcement of this policy. There are several First Nations artisans, including one TAFE student who has participated in the markets for over ten years. Kel is a successful wood sculptor and his large and professionally displayed booths are always a big tourist draw card. Kel has been able to make a decent living at the markets and finances a house, a vehicle and a moderate lifestyle through his business. The Port Douglas markets are open to everybody but competition to have a booth is intense and difficult to obtain. This has caused some consternation among First Nations producers who are working in seed jewellery. Unlike other aspects of First Nations arts, seed bead jewellery is not regulated as a particularly ‘Indigenous’ craft. The Port Douglas markets have a stallholder selling seed bead jewellery who is non-Indigenous. I have been told that First Nations workers in this craft have been denied a spot in the markets because market managers have said ‘we already have a seed bead jewellery stall’. One such artist is Michelle who has found her own unique method among the many artisans working in this medium. Instead of simply stringing natural seed beads, she knots her cords between each seed and adds multiple cords, creating her own style. She came into the craft after a private gallery owner looked at her glass and plastic bead samples and suggested that, as an Aboriginal, maybe she should work in seed beads.3 Michelle found a relative who knew how to work in this medium and over the years has become quite well known. Her jewellery is now represented at that same gallery which asked her to switch to seed beads. Michelle was upset at the convenors of the Port Douglas markets who have kept her from selling her work. She does not understand how a non-Indigenous person can sell such items.4 The first consideration in this examination is that not every artist participated in the outdoor markets. Most students who were involved chose to participate in UMI Art’s monthly Friday night First Nations markets. Formerly called the ‘Black Markets’, these markets are for First Nations artisans only and include live performances such as musical acts and Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander dance groups. These markets are only during the dry months – May through September  – while the Port Douglas markets are open all year-round. There

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are additional trading hours during the Cairns Indigenous Arts Fair and UMI makes a point of hosting a market during NAIDOC Week. In the past, UMI’s art markets have been fairly inexpensive to participate in – cost for a booth and lights was $50 per day. In 2012, the booth rentals were $100 per day. The market has an effect on several factors of art production: construction, price and representation. Boomerangs are a wonderfully illustrative example of how the markets affect these processes. I collected examples of boomerangs in 2010 all from different vendors (Figure  12). The boomerangs were all priced between $20 and $25 and they are all classified as ‘medium’ boomerangs, as generally, each stallholder had three sizes of boomerang:  small, medium and large. The prices of these boomerangs were all within $5 of each other but what is interesting to note is the relevant sizing of the objects and the execution of the paintings and designs. As a student at the TAFE and a participant in the research, I  purchased a boomerang from Kel at the Port Douglas markets (Figure  12, top). Kel’s woodwork is done in his shop in Babinda and is a combination of hand and machine-tooled techniques. The artisan uses only good quality native woods he has collected from foraging in the woods and friends’ scraps. The finish of the wood is smooth and polished and the painting is finely executed. Additionally, Kel always carefully signs his works. During the same Saturday I visited Kel’s stall, there was another boomerang stall on the other side of the markets. Although this boomerang was also listed as ‘medium’ size it was actually larger than Kel’s (42 cm wide by 21 cm tall) and made of a cheaper plywood (Figure  12, second from top). The boomerang is thinner and because of the wood quality, the paint has bled in places into the grain, having the effect of making the paint job look cheap. It is designed with two ‘x-ray’ kangaroos and two Aboriginal figures. When I asked about them, I was told they were ‘Mimih’ figures, a term borrowed from the Northern Territory. The price for this boomerang was the same as the one I bought from Kel. During a trip to the Cairns Saturday markets, I  bought another mediumsized boomerang, and I paid $20. The boomerang was also made from plywood; however, the artist controlled the bleeding of the paints and the design of a turtle is better executed (Figure 12, third from top). The motif resonates with the themes of the Great Barrier Reef which are popular among market stallholders in general. The final boomerang I  purchased was the smallest of the ‘medium’ sized (24.5  cm wide by 12  cm tall) and also the most expensive at $25 (Figure  12, second from bottom). The boomerang was purchased from UMI Arts during an



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exhibition celebrating their First Nations markets. What was curious to me with these four boomerangs was the fact that two of the four were made from cheap but easier to carve plywood. Additionally, all four had varying levels of artistic technique as well as size and yet they were all comparatively priced the same. I asked Kel about this as I saw his black wattle wood boomerangs as exquisite examples of wood carving and as someone who clearly took pride in his work. He told me that the market fixed the price he could sell his boomerangs but that his love of working with fine quality wood kept him working with black wattle. Indeed, Kel’s boomerangs clearly sold better at the markets than those of other stallholders but the relationship between the price, quality and techniques involved is important to note. All four boomerangs have fauna which are executed in a type of x-ray design where the body of the animal includes some form of decoration symbolizing the spine. This decoration includes dotting and separating out the parts of the body into stylized forms. The tips of three of the examples are embellished with their own designs and all four represent some aspect of the lived reality of the Cairns region. One final example of a market boomerang is another one from the Cairns Saturday markets. The artisan is a Djabugay woman who burns her designs on boomerangs fashioned out of black wattle (Figure 12, bottom). Part of the performance of the sale includes burning the buyers name in the back of the artefact. There are few artists working with boomerangs in this way at the markets and although the pricing for these are the same as previous examples, they are a bit smaller. The platypus is carefully incised with concentric half circles creating visual interest within the shape. I would like to use these boomerangs as a control sample of how the market creates a wide but fixed range of prices, techniques and construction. Various boomerang shapes did and do exist in the Cape York region, although not uniformly in all areas. Anthropologist Ursula McConnell documented crossboomerangs in her 1935 publication of her research in the Cairns with the Kúng’gá:ndyi and Yidinji Peoples. McConnel writes that the cross-boomerangs were used mostly for ceremonies and dances (1935:  50). Garth Murgha, a Gungandji man, told me that ‘killer boomerangs’ or boomerangs with one elongated side, were common among the Bama or Rainforest People around the Cairns and Port Douglas regions.5 The market, however, for these artefacts accepts only a certain size, a certain display and presentation which is then confined by certain prices. The accepted shape of the boomerangs popular in the market today are those seen in Figure 12 and mimic the shape dictated by QAC in 1937. The market also seems to produce a certain look and if the artist achieves

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this look, then the sale will be made regardless of potential issues of quality. Boomerangs, although with some variety of shape and style being evident, have almost the same content of barramundi, turtles, platypus and kangaroos. Items other than boomerangs, especially paintings, are more problematic for pricing and representation. Boomerangs have a set space within which an accepted range of imagery is allowed and this comes with an accepted range of prices. No one I met talked about boomerangs in the same way as paintings such as wanting to create a ‘new take’ on the boomerang industry or take boomerangs to ‘another level.’ Garth and his wife Estelle Tranby are working hard to introduce more traditional, rainforest styles of boomerang into the market, including cross-boomerangs and ‘killer’ boomerangs through their market stall Native Creations Australia. When students began to participate in the markets, they priced their works on their own and without really considering the existing market. The works they brought to the markets were the works they produced in the studio in order to complete the units put before them. In other words, the artworks the students brought to sell in the markets were not created with the markets in mind. This is an important point because although some of the rhetoric in the studio was to sell works and make money, the studio discourse was heavily influenced by a fine arts aesthetic and focus on quality. There was no talk in the studio about mass production of works which successful market sellers had perfected. As already stated, the comparisons students made were to established artists and not to market stall artists. There was a disconnect in thinking when it came to participation in the outdoor markets which the students soon learned. At the time of the first May markets, TAFE students had been producing works for barely three months. This did not deter students in participating in the markets. Painting was one of the first units undertaken and during this first market attempt, paintings dominated. The fabric unit was also in the process of being completed and there were quite a few samples of the batiks for sale. Three students put forth their works: Tommy, Leon and one other Aboriginal woman, Erin.6 The first tension to come up in the setting up of the stall was the issue of how people were pricing their works. Tommy, very unsure about the whole process and firmly of the mind that this was a learning process, marked his pieces very low. No single piece – regardless of quality or production – was more than $80. Erin’s paintings were anywhere from $150 to $300, and Leon was told by the printer who produced the artist’s proofs that prints were available as a single print at a minimum price of $325. The result was that Tommy sold a single work



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at $50 and one of Leon’s batiks – which he had priced at a reasonable $40 – also sold. Erin, on the other hand, sold nothing. During the June markets, paintings were almost non-existent although there were a couple for sale. The students chose instead to bring in a great deal more fabrics and smaller linoprints. This choice did not change the pricing of the objects much. Erin continued to price her works much higher than the other students while Tommy and Leon priced theirs at a lower range. When discussing prices, Erin used a rhetoric of needing to ‘value’ the artwork you produce. The lower price was seen as a denial of the ability students had and not a reflection of the type of environment in which the works were being sold. In fact, for Erin, who continued to sell poorly during markets, it was simply a matter of finding the right niche or medium to bring to the markets. It was never a question of re-evaluating the prices of the work or a question of evaluating the quality of the works. Leon and Tommy were two artists with very strong cultural associations and a desire to explore their heritage through their artworks. They were also the two students who experienced a number of successes in the markets with higher than average sales compared to other students. Their paintings and batiks were well received. In many ways, their works fulfilled the expectations of tourists coming to the markets, with the purchases of those works reinforcing Leon and Tommy’s expectations towards their own art. Their participation and success in the markets was known in the studio and their artworks were generally considered very highly (e.g. the most ‘deadlys’). This association between success and a strong cultural component in artworks – as well as the very strong cultural component of the classroom – no doubt fuelled a direct link between success and cultural presentation. Not all students participated in the markets but all students did participate in the major exhibitions which took place on the TAFE campus. The linkages enforced by the curriculum and the artists’ success in the outdoor markets created a very specific form of cultural representation which students internalized in their own works.

Galleries and exhibitions As already mentioned, there was very little supervision inside the studio and so the images produced for exhibitions can be said to be almost entirely dictated by the students themselves. Inside the studio, there were no real critiques of artworks. This meant that there were no critical critiques of content, and assumptions

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on what was or was not appropriate to depict in artworks went unchallenged. What I mean by this was no one suggested, ‘why don’t you paint landscapes?’ or questioned ‘why do you only do masks?’ Content was left largely to a curriculum with a heavy focus on a narrowly defined sense of ‘Indigenous culture’ and a welcoming audience made up of peers in an egalitarian atmosphere. The result is illustrated most clearly in the differences between what students were drawing in their private art journals and what they were presenting in gallery exhibitions. This section will look at the ways artists exhibited their art by reviewing what was on display during the end of the year exhibition. The exhibition was entitled Our S.T.Y.L.E. where S.T.Y.L.E. stood for ‘Simple Techniques You Learn Every day’. It was meant to invoke the feeling of the studio as a place where learning happened and this learning was on show for all to see. Unlike previous exhibitions, the end of year was left largely to the students’ own devices. They were given the most freedom in presenting works as the show was not curated in any formal way. In point of fact, the students stretched their own canvas, hung the show and produced much of the event themselves. As already mentioned, there was very little supervision inside the studio and so the images produced for this exhibition can be said to be almost entirely dictated by the students themselves. This exercise in representation illustrates the many influences in play. There was a marked difference between what students were drawing in their private art journals and what they were presenting for the gallery exhibitions. This is not just a question of medium preference but of content and there were several examples of how students approached their journals and the motifs they chose versus the images on the gallery walls. It is the analysis of these choices which makes me think that there is an association between ‘success’ in the arts industry with the cultural content in a composition and that this association is internalized within the students when exhibiting works. The first example describes a stylistic change between the art journal and the works for exhibition. Privately, Lynelle experimented with landscape paintings using gouache – a medium similar to watercolour but made to be more opaque. Her preference was to find a landscape photo in a library source  – usually a National Geographic or nature-type magazine – and carefully copy the image (Figure 13). The results are delicately rendered landscapes which resemble the original photo. What is unusual about these landscapes is that the genre of landscapes in general is rare within the studio. Horizon lines, vanishing points and even the concept of doing something realistically was not common when looking at the artworks which were on display during exhibitions or the markets. Yet within the private sketchings and experiments of the students, realism made



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a much larger appearance. As demonstrated in Chapter 5, students were capable of rendering realistic works. It is not a question then of ability but of preference. Lynelle chose to exhibit her work Seed Time (Figure 9) as both a reflection of her Aboriginal and Christian identities. As already discussed, the seeds are referencing the Biblical passage where Jesus tells the parable of the mustard seed and how faith may start out as the smallest of seeds but can grow into a large tree. Although this painting can be labelled as representational, it is highly stylized and Lynelle uses the principle of repetition to create a balanced composition of different seeds. The occasional red seed adds a bit of punch to the image. The style of this painting is a clear departure from the realism of the gouache landscapes. The colours in Seed Time are made up of earth tones and the way of rendering the seeds is with a single brush stroke. The bright colours and development of form demonstrated in her landscapes are not evident in this painting. Lynelle’s works were not the only example of this split between realism in the journal and stylized work in the gallery. Peter also had a well-developed body of work which included a split not only between realism and stylization but between the mundane and the ‘Indigenous’. Peter’s pencil drawings were sourced in the same manner as Lynelle’s gouache paintings. He would go through nature books and magazines and find an image he liked and then carefully reproduce it. The motifs included a variety of landscapes, oceanscapes, marine and bird life (Figure 14). These works too include a horizon line, vanishing points, shading and an overall realism which is lacking from the works on exhibition. What Peter did choose to exhibit are his linoprints as exampled in Feasting (Figure  15). This image includes motifs and design elements which are commonly found in Torres Strait Islander artworks, such as the netting pattern in the background, frangipani flowers, the Torres Strait pigeon, the sea turtle and artefacts such as a dhari (headdress), a gorr (dance shaker) and a warup (island drums). ‘Indigenous’ works such as these commonly lack the elements of works found in the journals like a horizon line or vanishing point. The turtle floats in a space of patterning with other objects placed around it. This image has a very ‘Indigenous’ flavour to it which Peter’s journal drawings do not. The pigeons and turtle are flat and there is a heavy preference for dense patterning over the development of form. Linoprints such as these are very popular among curators of Torres Strait Islander art and indeed, as will be discussed in Chapter 8, have become the hallmark of the genre. Peter was one of the students in Annette’s class and succeeded in developing a realistic painting method (see Figure 10) which he can also translate into other mediums such as pencil but which he chose not to exhibit.

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The division between the journal and the gallery is an interpretation on domains which are created by the students and reinforced by the curriculum and the market. The next two examples illustrate this division in even more radical forms as artists suppress the parts of them which they feel are outside the reception of people’s expectations of ‘Indigenous’ art. The following examples push the boundaries of acceptable works as they move into the genre of cartoon or comic art. Liz’s mixed media works on paper include lively figurative examples with pen and ink, watercolour and pastel. She has created a stylized composition of figures, usually in groups and often overlapping each other (Figure 16). Her use of colour is bright with a strong outline delineating forms. The figures have an urban edge to them with baseball hats turned backwards but they are also racially and gender unspecified. Her figures are generic, representing neither First Nations nor non-Indigenous personalities, male or female. Representations of figures were not common in the studio and people in groups like this were extremely rare in the studio and never found their way into exhibitions. Works like these are clearly an expression of contemporary life and views about the world but are considered outside what is acceptable to exhibit. What Liz put forward in gallery exhibitions was quite different from her more experimental works (Figure 17). In some ways, Liz was picking a piece which fit into the themes developed by the other students’ works. Her fibre works were well-designed with vibrant uses of colour and clearly depicted forms. Liz’s screenprint depicts several bats, flying about registers of tropical plant life, demarcated by red bands. The work is well-balanced and cleanly executed. Cairns has a large population of flying foxes; the large fruit bats are considered both a pest and an iconic symbol of the region. There was a large, positive reception for Liz’s piece and many others. No doubt this contributed to the choice to exhibit the work. The question remains, why the journal works remained in the journal and never made it to the gallery walls. The reception of the art journals was difficult to gauge as people did not share these with other students as often as they showed other works. In point of fact, I did not witness sharing of journals. What happened most often was a student would be working in their journal and another student would walk by, notice the work and comment positively on it. People knew what other students were doing – there were no secrets in the studio. But the display of journals, in the same manner as the display of ‘finished’ works, did not take place. The last example of the divide between the personal and a perceived First Nations art character comes from Charlie, a young Torres Strait Islander man



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from Darnley Island. Charlie, like a lot of artists I  have met, learned to draw from reading comic books. His pen and ink drawings have the classic hallmarks of this genre as seen in his works on Rebes (Figure 18). These hallmarks include a hyper-muscular figure and a stark delineation between shadows and highlights. Additionally, the influence of popular movies such as Terminator and Predator – as seen in the figure on the right’s stance and metalized skulls – is also apparent. These images are two of three Charlie produced inside the studio but not the first time he produced such images. When asked what he wanted to do after the programme, Charlie told me: My fantasy, well I’m really interested in comic books and stuff like that and probably cartoons and stuff like that. I [have] done that once in High school. We were trained to do those things and I was interested.

What concerns me in these examples is how students who have a strong sense of identity outside an ‘Indigenously’ conceived one still adhere to tropes in the artwork which are heavily influenced by those same First Nations conceptions. The works Charlie put forward to display focused not on comics or cartoons but artefacts from the Torres Strait as well as birds and marine life. Gabba Gabba (Figure 20) illustrates a type of club – a club which also makes an appearance in one of the Rebes works. What is happening with Charlie’s work is similar to those of other artists where there is marked contrast between what artists produce privately  – or produce when they don’t feel the work will be exhibited  – and those works which will be exhibited on the gallery walls. The development of form is abandoned for flat colour. Dense patterning along the handles and a strong black outline add to the Indigenous-ness of the work as too the cultural content evident in the naming using traditional language. These divisions between the journals and the exhibited works illustrate a type of identity within First Nations art. The lack of instructors inside the studio makes critiquing the practices of the studio more difficult, but there is clearly a focus on a particular form of First Nations art. Each student creates two separate domains within their art practices – a private domain and a public domain. These two domains each have their own set of rules in which the students abide by. The private domain is arguably the least limited where anything goes and the freedom to experiment with the medium at hand and the chosen motif is unregulated. The public domain is radically different and there is a perceived set of rules with which students must comply. As discussed in Chapter 4, the curriculum of the studio does much to both introduce and define the public domain and as already pointed out, students have expressed discomfort with some of those restrictions.

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Here, it is clear those restrictions have been internalized to create separate forms of personal expression. As discussed in Chapter 4, students were not in the studio to simply enter into the arts industry – nor were they in the studio only for the love of art (e.g. art for art’s sake). This chapter explored how perceptions of both the market and First Nations art influence the way students approach these two arenas. Influence is evidenced most obviously in the production of artworks. The role of the studio in these perceptions plays a large part in their development as no feedback or alternative form of art production is explored or demonstrated. Few people came to the studio to buy works and the outdoor markets were the only place to gain real-world feedback about the potential reception of an art piece. Why then, despite the almost blanket acceptance of artworks presented in the studio, did artists choose to only present and exhibit artworks which had a strong cultural or regional content? Why did none of the artists display some of the more personal works which they were creating inside their private journals? What I  saw with the practices inside the First Nations arts studio was a separation of domains between art which should go on the exhibition walls  – ‘Indigenous’ art  – and art which was done without pressure of public presentation. There are many more examples of this separation and it is clear that the students working inside the Shed had a wide range of interests and modes of expression which were not being nurtured or given space outside or even inside the studio. I don’t want to suggest that this was a mandate purposively created by the instructors or the administrators to limit the expression of First Nations artists. It is true that the course’s curriculum has a focus on cultural content and developing a cultural identity based on very specific, First Nations forms of expression. This curriculum is going unchecked and unchallenged and I have several examples of students struggling with the assumptions of the curriculum. The lack of critiquing in the studio does little to bring out the private domain and the high levels of technically executed works being produced inside that domain. Further, the process of peer-review alone puts students on a form of identityautopilot – a studio bubble – where they paint what they know to be acceptable and sellable for an environment that wants a certain form of expression. This was also reinforced when students came into contact with established artists at gallery openings where works with cultural content garnered the most focus. For example, when Joey Laifoo came to the studio to use the batik station, he and Leon talked extensively about Kaurareg art forms. Joey encouraged Leon to explore those artefacts which were underrepresented.



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What is viewed as value in the studio are artworks based on cultural and regional content  – not the personal. I  have tried to show how the market influences the form of cultural content through the connection students made between successful sales and the works which sold, but there are more factors at work determining artists’ choices on representation. For example, is the lack of the personal in exhibitions an extension of the First Nations autonomy concept? There is certainly a range of individuality – both in style and content – but the range is much more limited in exhibitions than in the private journals. Maybe the nature of these exhibitions is to be more conservative and maybe there is some bowing under market pressures to produce a certain type of First Nations art. My feeling is that there is a lot of pressure on students to put on a ‘deadly’ exhibition. People who have never shown artwork outside of friends and family are suddenly asked to put those works on display. That the students are both supportive of what each other produces and inwardly conservative about what to display reflects the struggle which is inherent in producing art and learning to be an artist  – learning to value that which is not already visible and then putting it out there for display. Potentially, by exhibiting pieces which are in harmony with each other, the students are yet again supporting each other and their deadly artworks. The complexity described inside the Shed involves the very process of developing a representation of self which never promised to be simple or easy. This chapter has in part tried to unpack and understand how First Nations people present themselves to the world, how they have internalized some of the rhetoric of what it means to be a First Nations artist and how, despite this internalization, they continue to create works which reflect contemporary, lived reality. The next two chapters will explore more about the actual products of such a journey.

Notes 1 Personal communication, 29 October 2010. 2 In order to protect the privacy and reputation of this person today, a pseudonym is used. 3 In bead working circles, ‘seed beads’ generally mean small glass beads produced in either Czechoslovakia or Japan. The term ‘seed beads’ in the field referred to beads made of plant seeds which were harvested wild and treated in the studio. 4 Cairns also sets up weekend markets along the esplanade which is less regulated than the Port Douglas markets in content. Seed bead jewellery sold there is also by

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a non-Indigenous stall owner but the managers do not limit the people involved and so Michelle has occasionally set up a booth during weekends she feels there are enough tourists and substantial crowds to make it worth her while. The Cairns weekend markets have intermittent involvement by Indigenous people who set up stalls to sell their paintings, boomerangs or jewellery. 5 Personal communication, 12 July 2018. 6 Erin is a pseudonym.

7

Design elements

Design elements like dots, cross-hatching and iconic Australian fauna are used inside the studio in many ways. Design elements are ways of indicating one’s Indigeneity, as abstractions of the natural world and as quick solutions to the problems of empty space. Meaning is generally ascribed after the fact  – after creation  – although there are notable exceptions. Regardless of when, artists do assign and read complex and multivalent meanings in artworks and motifs. Some design elements are highly symbolic of a collective First Nations identity. As already seen, artists in the studio create artworks that tap into specific forms of authority and identity which are enforced within the studio by its curriculum (Chapter  5) and through the sale of artwork in the marketplace (Chapter  6). The question then becomes, what are these design elements that are so readily accepted by the market and its buyers? Breaking down these design elements provides for a greater understanding of their use, their meaning and their influence on the Cairns TAFE artists. There are many factors determining how an artist chooses an image or design element in the construction of an artwork. Some are choices which reflect individual experiences and personalities and some are choices which reflect collective identities and associations. As the art historian Hans Belting writes, images are the ‘result of personal or collective knowledge and intention’ (Belting 2011: 9). The line between the individual and the collective is blurred and no one, not the artist or the anthropologist, can say for certain from where inspiration for an image comes. Above all, images do not come from one single place but a multitude of places. The significance of meaning in images is a result of the relationship and dialogue between the individual and the collective. Belting writes, ‘our internal images are not necessarily personal in nature, but even when they are collective in origin, we internalise them in such a way that we come to consider them as our own’ (2011: 16).

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The ‘collective’ in this instance refers to institutional frameworks which impose authority onto the studio space. These frameworks include: the history of Queensland First Nations art production (Chapter  2), the development of the TAFE ATSI arts programme (Chapter 3) and the presence of First Nations artworks from outside Queensland in the public sphere around Cairns (Chapter 2). The collective can also be seen as the First Nations group an artist belongs to – either quite broadly thought of such as Aboriginal or Islander or more specifically conceptualized like Yidinji or Mer. Artists come into the studio as ‘Indigenous’ students; it is mandatory to prove this heritage before being allowed in and before funding can be obtained. Paperwork that certifies a student’s Indigeneity is standard practice all over Australia. It entails a form that must be co-signed by a recognized, First Nations body (e.g. corporation, art centre). The form itself is fairly straightforward and as long as a student has someone who can vouch for their status, the individual is taken as Aboriginal or Islander (or both). The form creates an added hurdle for potential students to enter a TAFE programme, but since this is the norm for being a First Nations person in Australia, it is also good practice. As the form actually expires in a process that is typical of government bureaucracies, it is an exercise with which Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples must become familiar. The studio itself is advertised as a ‘deadly’ space – as a space in which First Nations art is produced. The entire structure of the studio however is framed by mainstream concepts of accountability, learning regimes, attendance requirements and expectations of production. Within the studio, there is a notion of shared Indigeneity and a common goal of producing ‘Indigenous art’. The importance of design elements in artworks to achieve this goal cannot be overstated as 90 per cent of artworks used some form of design element. A design element, in the broadest of terms, is an image, icon or even a particular use of line used in the studio to fill up blank spaces or embellish an object. The 10 per cent of artworks which did not use design elements included the few true landscapes and depictions of human figures executed within the studio as described in some examples in Chapter 6 (see Figures 16 and 18). Design elements are not only popular within the studio, but they are understood by the artists as markers of Aboriginality and Islander-ness as well. Using known markers of Indigenousness does several things: markers signify the identity of the artist to themselves; markers signify the ‘authenticity’ of the artwork to potential buyers; and in many instances, markers satisfy the course requirements. Given the tensions within Australia for First Nations communities to have their own unique design traditions, the historical polices within Queensland of



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importing artworks from outside communities and the pressures from market expectations, Cairns artists are facing a trifecta of hurdles. The concept of panAboriginal designs for example, creates problems not only for Cairns artists but also for many First Nations artists in urban and regional centres across the country. As such, it is important to explore what pan-Aboriginal means. Pan-Aboriginal is more than just an attempt to categorize a set of motifs and elements that all Aboriginal peoples across Australia share. The process of colonization tends to lump First Nations populations as a single ‘ethnicity’ and disregards the oftentimes wide variety of cultural difference. The term ‘ethnogenesis’ is used to describe the process in which varieties of peoples  – with different cultural outlooks and backgrounds  – come together politically as a single people (Jones and Hill-Burnett 1982:  232). As Jones et  al point out, ‘an important dimension of the emergent pan-Aboriginal ideology is a description and definition of the status of Aborigines [sic] in Australian society’ (1982: 219). The creation of the 1972 Aboriginal Tent Embassy was a significant political action taken by Aboriginal people as Aboriginal people  – that is, as a group identifying effort (Jones and Hill-Burnett 1982:  222). The struggle for self-determination and equality institutionalized Aboriginal ethnicity into something quite real (Jones and Hill-Burnett 1982: 224). The art historian Ian McLean also connects the concept of a pan-Aboriginal identity with the activism of the 1960s in his book White Aborigines (1998). This pan-Aboriginality concept did two things according to McLean: it opened up a market for First Nations art and it moved Aboriginal identity from a concept focused on blood to one focused on culture (McLean 1998:  108). McLean writes, ‘Even if the term “Aboriginality” does, in some minds, signify a cultural essentialism and traditionalism, the shift it effected from a racial to cultural paradigm has been paramount in the success of the Aboriginal art movement’ (1998:  108). McLean sees the commonality of Indigenous-ness as a way of empowerment through the development of ‘aesthetic aspects of traditional culture [such as] myths, songs, dances, painting’ (McLean 1998: 108). This commonality has its drawbacks. McLean cites Imant Tillers, an Australian-born visual artist, as objecting ‘to the ways in which “Aboriginality decontextualised” [sic] what … the real issues of contemporary society’ are (1998:  116). Tillers thought such identifying denied the cultural diversity of Australian society (McLean 1998: 117). Although McLean saw the creation of a pan-Aboriginal identity as creating a ‘contemporary space for Aboriginal art’ (1998:  119), Tillers’s fear of losing cultural diversity is a poignant one. Aside from blurring diversity, pan-Aboriginal identities, motifs or concepts also run

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the danger of creating stereotypes. Within the studio, design elements are a clear example of the internalization of these stereotypes. Ironically, if a tourist had visited QAC in the 1960s and 1970s, he would have found his dots. But even as the TAFE artists struggle against this stereotype, there exists a long road still to travel in educating the public about how artworks come to look the way they do. The conceptual problems with an idea like pan-Aboriginal surround the connection between form and meaning. This assumption of meaning in a design element has caused some debate among those involved in First Nations arts in Australia. In his exhibition essay ‘Why You Paint Like That’, Marshall Bell opens with the following statement: When I began painting I found the want for an authentic Aboriginal look based on and/or including my ancestral art was a very strong desire. I  searched for that authentic look and found it a very daunting task to uncover. There is a little to be found at any one place. It’s not just that there’s such minute institutional collections or supporting literature that makes it an overwhelming experience but the fact that material evidence is a scattered over many and distant locations. If one has little idea of what they are looking for, then when finding something of relevance, it’s hard to fully comprehend the value of what one I looking at. I find this a sad state of affairs particularly at a time when so many Indigenous people are searching for a connectedness to their past. Trying to define what their Aboriginality is and does it have an authority to it that makes a tangible connectedness to one’s own stories and art. (2010: 1)

In his opening paragraph, Bell touches on many of the issues already raised in this book: authenticity, identity and designs which resonate with those concepts of self as a First Nations person. Bell also brings in issues of the personal – ‘one’s own stories’ – in which the students at the TAFE also engaged. Bell writes about the difficulties inherent in researching one’s own culture in the aftermath of decades of removal and draconian policies in the development of contemporary artistic styles. In particular, the legacy of QAC can be felt in the following lines by Bell: South Eastern Australian Indigenous artists have been incorrectly accredited with incorporating art styles as having been stolen from other regions of Australia … I  assert that this line of thinking is meant to be denigrating and devaluing. It ignores there is a convergence in South Eastern Australia art … Aboriginal people were removed from their ancestral lands and forced onto Aboriginal missions and reserves. These unjust acts created an environment



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where there were converging points. Local identities converged with regional identities creating an [sic] new artstyle [sic] look. (2010: 2)

Bell further points to an edict written by the Australia Council in the early 1990s ‘directing South Eastern Australian Aboriginal artists not to use designs and symbols that appear in Central and Northern Australian art’ (2010:  3). Bell’s paper is in direct dialogue with this edict and the assumption that using ‘dots and cross-hatching’ when one is not an Aboriginal artist from the Central Desert or Arnhem Land is inappropriate. Bell crafts his arguments through the careful and meticulous research of the origins of Gamilaroi designs and motifs using archival records and photographs of tree carvings and possum skin cloak designs attributed to south-east Queensland.1 Bell builds up a definition of form based on a local authenticity which refuses to be aligned with designs from the Central Desert or Arnhem Land. Bell does what Howard Morphy has called for (Morphy 2009) in developing a local Gamilaroi art history. These local art histories need to include an understanding of changes in style and form over time as well as the reception and use of images by artists and groups of artists working in the same ‘school’ or mode. Chapter 2 set up the crucial historical underpinnings which have caused a crisis of representation among Queensland First Nations artists. What motifs and design elements can be called ‘local’ when the decades of importation of outside art styles have become enmeshed in local aesthetics? How are design elements used in the backdrop of a complex and contested history of First Nations art history?

The content analysis method The method for ascertaining the answers to these questions was to do a content analysis of the images in order to understand the iconological significance of the design elements. The art historian Erwin Panofsky wrote that the lowest type of meaning is often confused with form and calls for the need for a third level of analysis:  the iconological analysis which goes beyond simply looking at form (1970: 39). Iconological analysis is crucial in the study of First Nations art history as common looking forms may be interpreted as common motifs or pan-Aboriginal motifs. This happens often incorrectly because of a lack of the local history in which the image is produced, as already described by Flinders

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and Bell. An iconological analysis of images incorporates not only what artists say about an image but what the images themselves illustrate given the social, stylistic and political changes which have shaped the aesthetic in which the artists are working. According to Panofsky, the meaning of an image is not understood through a single action or aspect but only through ‘co-ordinating a large number of similar observations and by interpreting them in connection with our general information’ (1970:  28). He calls such a skill ‘synthetic intuition’ (ibid.). This form of analysis includes identifying ‘pure forms’ or ‘certain configurations of line and colour, or certain peculiarly shaped lumps of bronze or stone, as representations of natural objects such as human beings, animals, plants, houses, tools and so forth’ (1970: 28). In Aboriginal art history, for example, this part of the analysis would include identifying forms such as concentric circles, dots, cross-hatching and the depictions of flora and fauna within an artwork. Panofsky admits that this stage of the analysis ‘presupposes a familiarity with specific themes or concepts’ but goes to say that this presupposition can come from a variety of sources (1970: 35). My familiarity with the studio and the types of design elements used, as well as those elements which the students pointed out to me and those sourced in reference books (Haddon 1935; Lawrie 1970; Wilson 1988), develop the synthetic intuition used to isolate the design elements for the content analysis. The content analysis focuses on the representation within the artworks and examines the design elements used by the students involved in the TAFE programme. This content has been developed using Panofsky’s method of isolating the elements and includes 420 artworks, all produced inside the arts studio. Although not every artwork produced could be included, the sample size is large enough to meet statistical significance. Additionally, statistical weighing has been employed as to not bias the results in favour of one artist over another.2

Design elements of Indigeneity To facilitate Panofsky’s style analysis, a content analysis of the images was completed in the studio through a process of asking a series of questions across the set of artworks in order to find commonalities and differences across the set. ‘Images’ for the sake of this research include paintings, linocuts, batiks, line drawings, carvings and digital works, although this term is hotly debated (see Mitchell 1986 and Belting 2011 for much more in-depth discussions). A total



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of 34 questions were developed around attributes and design elements of the images. An attribute is a concept such as an image being representational, having a horizon line or a border or utilizing a form of perspective. These questions come from my familiarity with the images and an attempt to answer the larger question: What do Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders paint? There are design elements which can be construed as indicators of Aboriginality or Islander-ness and which can conceivably be viewed as pan-Aboriginal motifs. There are several design elements utilized by the students and they are listed in Table  7.1 and illustrated as Figure  19. The design elements cover the wide range of infill possibilities used within the studio. Some of these works have cultural significance while others are used because of their perceived social or cultural capital. The elements which are viewed as having social and cultural capital are used as expressions of Indigeneity. Going through all 420 images and counting the number of times each design element appeared in the artworks, the results indicate the relative frequency of each element. Not all design elements were used equally across the studio. As Table  7.2 shows, the most frequently used design elements were zigzag/wave, circle/oval, dot and cross-hatching. Notably, there are many elements which were used in less than 1 per cent of artworks. Many of these elements have the most culturally embedded meanings. Frequency is not always an indicator of meaning or cultural significance as will be demonstrated. Table  7.3 shows the frequency of use of design elements by how artists identified. There are several elements which are dominated by one group over another. For example, Torres Strait Islanders were the only artists to use Table 7.1  List of design elements used in the studio •  Circle/Oval •  Crescent •  Cross-Hatch •  C-Shape •  Dash •  Dense Pattern •  Dot •  E-Shape •  Fish Tail •  Fish Teeth •  Free-Form Polygon •  Nested Lines

•  Rhomboid •  Rhombus/Netting •  Spiral •  Square •  Star •  Tear Drop •  Trapezium •  Triangle •  V-Shape •  Wave •  Weave •  Zigzag

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Table 7.2  Frequency of design elements in the studio Design Element

Percentage (%)

Zigzag/Wave Circle/Oval Dot Cross-Hatching/Nested Lines Rhomboid Triangle Spiral Weave Rhombus/Netting Free-Form Patterning Less than 1%   V-Shape   Fish  Teeth   Dense Patterning   Square   Star   Crescent   Dash   Tear  Drop   C-Shape   E-Shape   Trapezium   Fish Tail

18.60 14.17 12.93 6.95 5.76 5.49 5.23 5.01 4.68 3.50

17.68

c-shapes, fish tails, stars and weaves as design elements. These are also the elements which have the highest cultural content behind them and will be discussed in Chapter 8. Torres Strait Islanders were also the dominant users of cross-hatching, e-shape, fish teeth, rhomboid, square, V-shape, wave and zigzag elements although Aboriginal artists used these designs as well. Aboriginal artists were the dominate users of circle/oval, crescent, dash, dot and tear drop design elements. Blank space was anathema inside the studio and students created and utilized any and every possible strategy to fill the space with something. The zigzag and its close cousin the wave were by far the most popular but it is in the dot and the cross-hatch we find artists tapping into the national dialogue of First Nations art and the concept of pan-Aboriginal elements. The ways in which these elements were used need to be understood on their own terms – that is, the terms of the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander arts studio.



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Table 7.3  Frequency of design elements in the studio according to how artists identify Design Element

Circle/Oval Crescent Cross-Hatching/Nested Lines C-Shape Dash Dense Pattern Dot E-Shape Fish Tail Fish Teeth Free-Form Polygon Rhomboid Rhombus/Netting Spiral Square Star Tear Drop Trapezium Triangle V-Shape Wave Weave Zigzag

Aboriginal Artists (%)

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Artists (%)

69.38 69.74 15.91

9.80

78.71 62.70 52.82 35.22

17.57

5.52 43.25 15.49 48.94 78.72 27.61

12.43

84.22 100.00 56.78 17.21 22.51

15.78

23.71

3.17

11.60

3.83 13.79 11.95

10.47 2.04

Torres Strait Islander Artists (%) 20.82 30.28 80.91 100.00 3.64 37.25 35.57 64.66 100.00 82.10 56.76 80.66 51.09 7.49 60.51 100.00

32.75 82.79 75.44 100.00 76.29

Dots Dots are one of the more complex design elements to tackle in First Nations art in Australia as already described by Lynelle in Chapter  1. According to the anthropologist John Carty, ‘ “dot paintings” have become synonymous with Aboriginal art, and dotting itself has been the principal technical means through which Balgo artists have explored the medium of acrylic art’ (2011:  231). Eric Michaels calls the dotting used in Papunya Tula as ‘mere fill, inconsequential, and often omitted in the ground and body paintings on which [paintings] were based’ (1994: 155). Although Michaels calls such dotting in Papunya as ‘semantically empty dots’ (1994: 155), Carty traces the

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dissolving of the symbols of the sand drawing tradition towards an abstracted means of representing culture. Carty describes how for Balgo artists, ‘dotting went from being the means by which semantic elements of a painting were highlighted, to becoming the very grounds of that meaning itself ’ (2011: 232). Carty uses the concept of ‘aesthetically mobile elements’ to describe the shift from the symbolism of early Balgo art to the highly non-representational imagery produced today. In Painting Culture, the anthropologist Fred Myers quotes an arts advisor of the Western Desert, Andrew Crocker, and his understanding of dots. According to Crocker, ‘dotting is secondary to the “cursive” designs that establish the painting’s formal frame and narrative content’ (Myers 2002:  67). Myers notes that earlier paintings had few dots whereas later paintings had increasingly more and more dots but Crocker sees this development as dots becoming the ‘all-covering frame from which the cursive design stares out’ (2002: 67). Myers writes that ‘kinaesthetic delight notwithstanding, a more plausible argument would be that both cross-hatching and dotting are motivated by an underlying aesthetic interest in producing visual brilliance’ (2002:  68), an argument in itself which echoes Morphy’s concept of shimmering (1991). Myers points to Crocker’s concept of the ‘horror vacui’ (2002: 68), an aversion to empty spaces. It is my observation that the empty spaces are just as anathema inside the ATSI studio. As an Aboriginal-semantic design element, dots are the second most common design element used in the studio. The dot is used as an expression of First Nations identity but a particularly Aboriginal identity. Seventy per cent of the paintings which utilized dots were done so by Aboriginal artists. The authority to use dots is an important point. Students in the studio had no problem correcting other students when they felt they were using a symbol or design which was inappropriate, but this happened through careful negotiations of how the element should be used. There was no outright ‘you shouldn’t use that’. Torres Strait artists would confer with each other over books with designs they were interested in using in their artworks. Talk was generally about the origin of the design – from the western or eastern islands – and the ability to do the design was then based on the heritage of the artist. For Aboriginal artists, it was also a case of sharing information relevant to the person’s heritage. Ian would share the extensive collection of Yidinji historical documentation he had collected through his experiences at the TAFE and his involvement in Native Title proceedings with the first year students who also identified as Yidinji. In both cases, cultural protocols were being negotiated as problems came up. There



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was some confusion as to the ‘correct’ answers sometimes. When I asked Allen if he would feel comfortable producing Vanuatu designs on the islands, he balked at the suggestion and said, ‘Probably not’. At one point, Michelle was unhappy with her paintings and wanted them to look ‘more Aboriginal’. Jack helped her out by showing her how to divide the canvas into registers and how to use dots as, in his words, ‘grass or seeds or whatever’. There are two notable forms the dots are indexical of:  kinetic energy or movement and mass. Regardless of which of these two forms of expression are used, each one is called upon as markers of Aboriginal identity. The dot as kinetic movement is exampled in Allan’s painting, Lizard (Figure 21). Allan has designed the lizard in the centre of the linoprint among a background of pattern encircling the main form. Modulated dots are used around the lizard as a way of outlining and adding visual interest. The way the dot is utilized is as a marker of space, an outline of form and as an expression of movement. The dot does not have any cultural association or orientation as such – nothing specifically articulated as a cultural marker. But the dot used in the studio – in this form – very clearly marks the artist as Aboriginal, as First Nations and as one with the authority to use the dot in this manner. Carty writes about the Balgo invention of kinti kinti (close close) style of dotting where dots were overlaid on each other, creating areas of uniform colour with zero negative space between the dots (2010:  236). Carty also explores other variations of dotting in his thesis as methods artists use in developing a unique style in a painting. The development of one’s own artistic method was certainly the case in the studio as students referred often to their pursuits of developing their own style. Allan’s dotting was unique among the artists, even as it was used as a hallmark of Aboriginal identity. The most common usage of the dot is ‘dot as mass’ which sometimes is representative of something from the physical world. Darren’s Moon Cycle (Figure 22) uses dots in his batik as waves of water which are affected by the cycles of the moon. Darren also includes dots scattered throughout the background as symbols of stars. The artist admits he chose the dots to also give the image balance and visual interest and later added meaning to them. As Michaels noted in his own research, ‘the creation of value now can come quite late’ (1994: 143). This is a very common phenomenon in the studio as students often produce designs based more on artistic instinct than on other sources. Darren uses dots often in this manner – as mass and as a tool to balance a composition – throughout his other compositions in the studio, ascribing meaning only after the work is finished.

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Pellista’s Coral Spawning (Figure  8) uses dots as representations. Once a year, the coral in the Great Barrier Reef National Park spawn – emitting tiny spore clouds. This phenomenon is well known among First Nations peoples and Cairns locals as the event is celebrated and promoted in dive shops with special night trips to the Reef. Pellista has created a colourful and abstracted backdrop with small green circles representing the coral and pink and purple dots radiating out from the green. The backdrop avoids the usual flatness that is typical inside the studio because Pellista avoids large patches of uniform colour. The background is still abstract but the colouring gives the impression of depth, movement and a general sense of life in the reef (or reef-ness). This leaning towards a more realistic or naturalistic mode of painting is typical of Pellista’s personal style. Dots used in the studio cannot and should not be confused with the dotting traditions from the Central Desert. Figures 8, 21 and 22 all illustrate how dots in the studio have their own unique usage which varies from artist to artist and painting to painting. Pellista used dots as a form of representation whereas Darren used dots as a more abstracted concept. Allan’s usage clearly tapped into the pan-Aboriginal motif of dots but one which cannot be confused with any style from the Northern Territory. However, forms of Allan’s dotting can be seen along the eastern coastline of Australia by urban and regional Aboriginal artists. This form of dotting cannot be seen as semantically empty, however, just because it does not have the exact same deep history as those traditions Carty and Myers write about. Instead, this form of dotting needs to be understood as a design element that resonates with regional and urban Aboriginal artists in culturally significant ways. The meaning of the dotting has to be seen as a multivalent spectrum of significance which cannot be generalized. One final example of dots  – or rather of not using dots  – comes from an example from a Hope Vale artist. In her own words, she describes her approach to art as follows: I’m doing my own thing. I don’t do the dots. I try and do what I like as a person as an Aboriginal person but I  don’t do the kangaroo, I  don’t do the snake or the turtle. I don’t have to do that to say that I’m Aboriginal. I don’t have to do scriggly lines or dots or circles or that to know who I am as an Aboriginal.

I asked her if she described herself as an Aboriginal artist and she responded by saying, ‘No. No. Not yet. I think I’ve got a long way, and if I reach that point, I don’t think I will. Because to me, art is part of who you are. Art is who you are inside.’ Her art practice worked in direct opposition to what she considered



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‘Aboriginal works’. She avoided the turtle and the dot as a way of marking out her own personal identity.

‘Cross-hatching’ and nested lines Aside from dots, cross-hatching is another popular index of Indigeneity. Crosshatching is more commonly known from bark paintings such as those from the top end of the Northern Territory. Two private galleries in downtown Cairns were full of paintings from Arnhem Land, including didgeridoos, boomerangs and other artefacts – all with cross-hatching designs. Cross-hatching is a culturally complex design element in Arnhem Land. The two most comprehensive studies into the bark painting styles of Arnhem Land are by Luke Taylor (western Arnhem Land) (1996) and Howard Morphy (eastern Arnhem Land) (Morphy 1991, 2008). Bark paintings done in Arnhem Land are a technical and symbolic act requiring not only a fine hand (skill) but also a knowledge of process and cultural appropriateness (experience). Cross-hatching as a design element has become part of the popular expectations of the category ‘Aboriginal art’. As outlined in Chapter  2, crosshatching from Arnhem Land was imported into Queensland for artists to copy and sell. However, cross-hatching was also used in Queensland in pre-contact times. As Bell points out in his essay, cross-hatching was found on both kangaroo skins and tree carvings in southeast Queensland as early as 1904 (Bell 2010: 10). Cross-hatching is one of several design elements Bell demonstrates as having a long history in his region. Additionally, cross-hatching is found in other regions of Queensland such as the rock art of the Laura region (Trezise 1971) and the rock art of the Carnarvon Ranges (Goddard et al. 1941). Despite the historical legacy, the regional traditions and market popularity, cross-hatching was not popular among Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander artists in Cairns. Cross-hatching was used in the studio in a classical atelier method as a form of shading and to create volume. Tommy, for example, enjoyed experimenting with all visual mediums and techniques and used cross-hatching as a design trope to either create volume or quickly fill in space. On the whole, the artists in the studio used cross-hatching in this same fashion. There was one artist who used cross-hatching in ways which could be considered indexical of Arnhem Land artistic styles. The artist used elements like yellow, white and red cross-hatching in a number of works and talked about referencing those bark paintings from Arnhem Land he saw on display in Cairns. This was the rare example though.

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Nested lines are a different story from cross-hatching. Nested lines are illustrated in the works found in Figures  20 and 21 and they are a short series of parallel lines, coming together at acute angles; they appear as if mimicking wrapped cloth. I initially saw them as a form of concentric line. It was suggested however that this design element is potentially a form of cross-hatching which might have been a descendent of the bark paintings imported by QAC for copying in Queensland.3 There is a lot of evidence for this. Most of QAC’s cottage industries were located in and around the Cairns region. Furthermore, nested lines are not a design element you see often in artistic traditions elsewhere in the country. Nested lines could also be said to be a variation of the design element for weaving. The main difference between nested lines and the weave is that the series of parallel lines are usually perpendicular to each other instead of at angles. This is illustrated in the list of design elements found in Figure  19 but in works, it is demonstrated in the background of Peter’s work (Figure 23) and Allan’s work surrounding his lizard in Figure 21. Potentially for Torres Strait Islanders, nested lines are a reflection of their long tradition of weaving. Regardless of where nested lines come from, they were a popular motif among all the artists in the studio and deserve further discussion. The way nested lines are employed vary but they are popular within the studio among both Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander artists as a type of infill. Allan’s work, Lizard (Figure 21), represents a common example of nested lines. Allan uses the design element in the legs of the lizard as well as the encircling register around the entire animal. Repeated lines come together at angles to create visual interest but it is also an indexical symbol of First Nations identity. Nested lines have no stories or attributed meanings behind them within the studio. The artists who employ this method of infill had no answers when I asked direct questions about the meaning of nested lines and I overhead nothing which might attribute meaning. The nested line, like the dot, creates a form of Aboriginality which artists use to give their works an authenticity and a particularly ‘Aboriginal’ feel to them. Nested lines are as much of a marker of Aboriginality inside the studio as the dot and their use is both a purposeful and internalized form of First Nations mark-making and communicating. However, nested lines are not specific to Aboriginal artists. In point of fact, the majority of examples of nested lines are attributed to Torres Strait Islanders. Nested lines in Islander works have a different treatment altogether and even as nested lines are markers of Aboriginality in works by Aboriginal artists, their



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treatment in Islander works provide as much of an Islander identity for them. An excellent example of this is Charlie’s Gabba Gabba painting (Figure 20). The handle of the club includes several design registers of nested lines. These lines can be read as both design and as potential wrapping of material across the handle. One final note on nested lines and their potential cousin the weave. Nested lines are used deliberately and are different from the weave element. For example, Figure 32 is a painting of a weris or fish scoop by Eddie Sam from Erub Island in the Eastern Torres Strait. The handle of the weris illustrates the weave design element. Although superficially similar and potentially historically related, the weave and nested line elements are semantically and technically two different designs.

Fauna Design elements are not the only methods of expressing and asserting First Nations identity. The content analysis asked a set of queries around the type of fauna found in the ATSI studio. The results were that of the 420 images surveyed, 87 per cent had some type of flora and/or fauna. The natural world can often be symbolic of First Nations life in Cairns, with the one notable exception of the human figure. The human body was rarely depicted in the studio and only a handful of artists included them in their occasional works (see Figures 16 and 18). Of those artists, Leon alone exhibited a work with a human figure (Figure 30) while Liz and Charlie exhibited other works for reasons explored in Chapter 6. Tommy drew and exhibited the body on a regular basis (see Figures 27, 29 and the back cover of the book) but out of hundreds of works, these handful remain the lone exceptions inside the studio. Table 7.4 shows the distribution breakdown of fauna, according to species. Platypus, kangaroos, turtles and types of fish catered to tourist expectations of First Nations motifs and the artists were only too happy to oblige them if it sold more works. The distribution of fauna across the studio showed that there were some animals which were commonly shared and some which were only done by one group. There are seven categories of fauna which were produced solely by Aboriginal artists. These are: echidnas, eels, frogs, koalas, octopi, platypus, possums and various insects. Fauna which was solely produced by Islanders include dogs, jelly fish, sea horse and star fish. These are major totems on the

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Table 7.4  Distribution of fauna types within the studio Fauna Category

Aboriginal Artists (%)

Bird Insect Crocodile Crustacean Dugong Echidna Eel Fish Octopus Platypus Reptile Shark Shell Squid Star Fish Stingray Turtle

51.45 86.81 37 47.65 34 100.00 100.00 53.33 100.00 100.00 45 6 61.41 14 23 47.45

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Artists (%)

6 16 10

6

21

16 16

Torres Strait Islander Artists (%) 49 13 57.04 36 56.34

41

55.17 72.42 39 85.90 100.00 61.00 36

eastern and western Islands which gives some context to their presence in the studio. ‘Kangaroo’ is split almost evenly down Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander lines. This animal too is seen inside the studio as a pan-Australian icon that does not belong solely to one group or the other. This indicates that people may be following a definition of cultural association, but it can also mean that artists are drawing from their own personal experiences. Kangaroos and wallabies are everywhere in Cairns and are found all the way up to the tip of Cape York. As well, bats, birds, crustaceans, fish, reptiles, stingray and turtles seem to be equally distributed between the two major groups, reflecting the Cairns region’s ‘where the rainforest meets the reef ’ motto. In fact, the fauna which are produced most evenly across all three First Nations groups – crocodile, crustacean (hermit crab), fish, stingray and turtle – heavily reflect life in Far North Queensland as the most common sights and are also some of the most frequently produced images in the studio. That said, the crocodile, dugong and the stingray are also major totemic creatures for both Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders. In situations like this, it is necessary to look at an individual’s personal history and reasoning behind the image choice.



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Looking at this data, one must be careful in assuming that any creature is a totem of the artist. The animal could be another tourist dollar bid or it could simply be because, like the crocodile, the animal is found all over the region and it is therefore a part of the local lived reality of Cairns. Totem associations existed and were known among some of the artists but in many cases artists were painting what they knew and what they saw. It is key to unpack an individual artist’s meaning behind their chosen image as even artists from the same region may have different reasons for choosing the fauna they depict. Peter depicts the turtle often in his works (Figure 15) but it does not represent a totem for him so much as a concept he has of the islands. Further, he does the turtle well and receives compliments from the students which encourages him further. Peter enrolled in the TAFE arts programme on the encouragement of his sister who filled out the paperwork for him. He is a shy and quiet man who diligently works on his assignments without fuss. The turtle is familiar to him and a part of his comfort zone within the studio. In looking at the range of fauna depicted, the aim is to see if there are obvious motifs and trends which can help us identify a particular Torres Strait Islander or Aboriginal aesthetic. The most frequently depicted animals were fish, birds, shells, turtles, dugongs, crustaceans, sharks, crocodiles and reptiles. In other words, the animals which are generally shared across the whole studio are the ones most commonly found in the Cairns region. Many of these animals are also classic hallmarks of Australian life, such as turtles, sharks, crocodiles and sharks and none of these categories were really belonging to one group or another. However, it was the category of birds that was most surprising as the source of a unique identity between Aboriginal and Islander artists.

Birds Within the 420 artworks analysed, 12 per cent included some kind of bird. This is a high percentage for a motif to be found in the works produced in the studio. Although a lot of birds were ‘generic’, without unique markings, there were a number of instances when the birds were drawn with careful detail and the species could be identified. Table 7.5 breaks down the birds between Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander artists (artists who identified as both did not produce any bird images). Only four birds are shared between the two groups: cassowary, frigate bird, sea eagle and generic bird. These four birds were not shared equally across the studio.

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Table 7.5  Distribution of bird species within the studio Birds Azure Kingfisher Black-Capped Tern Brolga Brush Turkey Bush Curlew Cassowary Chickens Emu Frigate Bird Generic Bird Lightning Bird Magpie Goose Mistle-Toe Bird Pigeon Red-Headed Honeyeater Red-Tailed Cockatoo Scrubhen Sea Eagle Shorebirds Sulphur-Crested Cockatoo Torres Strait Island Pigeon Wompoo Fruit Dove Yellow-Breasted Boatbill

Aboriginal Artists (%)

Torres Strait Islander Artists (%) 100 100

100 100 100 75 100 12 47

25 100 88 53 100

100 100 100 100 100 100 40 100 100

60

100 100 100

Focusing in on frigate birds, 90 per cent were executed by Torres Strait Islanders. This preference is explained in part because Islanders from the eastern islands commonly have the frigate bird as their totem. Other than these four birds  – cassowary, frigate, sea eagle and generic – all other bird categories belong solely to one group or another. Even though this category makes up for 12 per cent of all artworks produced, there is a surprisingly high level of individuality within this attribute with very little overlap between Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander artists. There are birds which solely belong to an Aboriginal aesthetic and birds which belong to a Torres Strait Islander aesthetic. The scrub hen and Torres Strait pigeon are two birds which are ubiquitous throughout Cairns. Although



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I  lived in town, I  can claim to have seen the scrub hen at least four or five times a week and I  saw the Torres Strait Island pigeon every day. Yet the content analysis shows that these two birds in particular, despite being a part of everyone’s lived experience including mine, had specific cultural associations. Only Torres Strait Islander artists depicted the pigeon (Figure  24) and only artists of Yidinji heritage ever painted the scrub hen (see Ian’s work in Figure 6). I cannot simply say that one’s lived experience is the sole shaper of their artistic repertoire. Artists are coming to their images and creating their own image gallery in many ways. Animals were used as well to illustrate a form of Indigeneity. The Torres Strait pigeon (or pied imperial-pigeon (Ducula spilorrhoa) depending on your reference book) has a pre-contact distribution all over the top end of Australia – from Broome to the Torres Strait and all along the Gulf and Cape York regions (Morecombe 2000:  156). This bird was once so abundant it was considered a pest (Wirrimbirra 2010 [online]). Despite this abundance and distribution, the Torres Strait pigeon in the Cairns TAFE was solely the representational domain of Torres Strait Islanders. However, to outsiders, the pigeon is not ‘read’ as Islander and only those who can identify the bird would even think about associating it with a specific cultural group. To the artists in the studio, the bird was ‘Islander’ and only Islanders depicted them. This was not the same for all fauna depicted. The turtle was one which was handled by all artists  – it was one of the few fauna which was shared across all individuals. However, the turtle was not represented in the same way and the different expressions of the turtle were indicative of different expressions of Indigeneity. Eddie’s turtle was a symbol of his totems and heritage as well as his knowledge of traditional language. Peter’s turtle was a representational and realistic rendering of an animal he was fond of depicting. Fauna was used in much the same way as design elements to convey to a wider audience the levels of First Nations identity and expression. Inside the ATSI studio, there is a clear need to fill up space. Images were rarely left designed with empty spaces. Infill patterns were used to create densely patterned areas and paintings typically employed three to four types of infill. The need to fill up space is a desire felt by most artists in the studio. Although utilized in various ways, the elements chosen represent aspects of an Indigeneity which is supported by the programme’s curriculum and by the market. The content analysis shows how the students approached mark making in the studio and how they came to associate meaning to those marks. In most cases, meaning came

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later – the design element first. The next chapter will explore how the process of filling up space was not always dictated by one’s outward identity or outward claim to culture but by an artist’s personal experiences and constructions of self. The next chapter will also illustrate not only how cultural associations dictate cultural content but also how it might not.

Notes 1 Bell’s ground-breaking essay is available online: http://wag.com.au/ files/9113/3342/7328/WhyYouPaintLikeThatEssay.pdf (accessed 1 November 2019) and is highly recommended for further reading. 2 It is obvious from the onset of this method that not all artists produced an equal amount of works; the production rate of each artist varied considerably. For example, one single artist produced over sixty-five images during the course of the year within the studio alone. (He produced dozens more outside the studio which are not included in the content analysis.) On the other hand, quite a few students produced less than ten works during the same time period. The 420 artworks were evaluated based on a series of 34 questions which were recorded in an Excel spreadsheet. In order to avoid a single artist skewing the content analysis results, statistical weighting was applied to each image. In this instance, a statistical weight is a number assigned to an image which gives the relative frequency of the attribute in question. In order to calculate a statistical weight, each artist’s total production value equalled one which was then divided by the total works produced. For example, an artist producing fifteen works had a statistical weight of 0.066 assigned to each artwork he or she produced; an artist producing twenty-one works had a statistical weight of 0.047. This statistical weighting gives a relative value to each image so that when viewing the results, an equal relational comparison between all works is created. In this way, each image is ‘equal’ in relation to the other images produced. There are two issues with this type of weighting. First, there is the question of personal meaning in artworks. Artists who only produce four works – with a statistical weight of 0.250 – are considered the same as artists who produce much, much more. There are a couple of considerations I am taking which help alleviate this issue. Looking at the overall results, the few cases of extremely low producers do not influence the outcomes negatively and, indeed, simply reinforce the overall trend or story the content analysis is telling. Additionally, only four assignments dictated specific motifs in an artwork (such as self-portraits). On the whole, assignments were very openended with regard to content. With this in mind, I feel sure that the artworks



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which the low producers created are as valuable to the study as the rest of the works. The second issue caused by using statistical weighting is that despite this modification, there are still some over-producers who do influence the results. These cases are noted in the analysis. 3 Howard Morphy, personal communication, 1 August 2012.

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Cultural content

There are many connections between what artists depict in their artworks and their First Nations identities. One of the broader themes encompassing this discussion is based on the concept of cultural content, the very content the TAFE programme was designed to foster in the first place. Despite the fact that all students were First Nations and accepted as such, there were expectations of representation and knowledge about their Indigenous heritage that lead them back to concepts of ‘culture’ and ‘cultural content’. How can artists make their Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander identity read as such through their art? Three artists were particularly knowledgeable about the culture from which their heritage stemmed. What is meant by this is that they had some grasp of their native language, knew some of the traditions of their people, had extensively read books on the history of their regions and knew a great deal about the visual material held in museum collections. They then chose to represent all of this in their artworks. Results from the content analysis show the differences in cultural representation between Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander artworks. For example, as already mentioned, less than 10 per cent of all the works produced were non-representational, with the majority of works being of something. However, the works by the Yidinji artist Ian Jensen were almost all nonrepresentational. Examining Ian’s work will show why non-representational works were not prevalent in the studio at large because there was no cultural reason for this style of artwork among artists who were not Yidinji. Looking at Torres Strait Islander artworks, one can see that there are specific forms of content which are utilized according to specific island identities. Furthermore, Torres Strait Islander artistic traditions use design elements unique to them. The studio also had one student who was of the Kaurareg Nation in the Torres Strait. Leon Namai’s artwork shows how the boundaries between Aboriginal and Islander are blurred and need to be looked at with an informed eye.

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Initial surveys of art produced in the Far North of Queensland showed a marked difference from the non-representational traditions of the Central and Western Deserts. One of the hallmarks of First Nations art in the Cairns region was the preference for images to be of things and objects and the content analysis explored if an image was representational or non-representational. The words ‘representational’ and ‘non-representational’ are chosen in order to avoid confusion with more nuanced and complicated art historical terms such as realistic/realism, abstract/abstraction and stylized/stylization. Images can be abstract and still be representational of a thing such as in Ian’s Bigunu series, discussed below. In order to avoid confusion and putting a more evaluative term to the image, the terms ‘representational’ and ‘non-representational’ are used. The results of this inquiry indicate an overwhelming preference for representational images, with 90 per cent of artworks classified as representational. These results indicate that non-representational images, or what is called ‘abstraction’ in the Central Desert art movement (see Munn 1960; Myers 1991a; Carty 2011; Schmidt 2012), are not common in the studio. The results from this line of inquiry indicate that non-representational images are not a part of the TAFE repertoire because, in part, it is not a part of the personal aesthetics or cultural backgrounds of the individual artists. Significantly, non-representational imagery is not a part of the artists’ research into their histories. In examining the books and resources the artists use in developing their artistic and First Nations identities, it is filled with stories about specific animals, people and places which are illustrated by artefacts, photos and drawings of the natural world such as Segar Passi’s detailed water colours of birds and fish (see Sheehan 2010). The artists are not given an abstracted world – they are presented with a world of things and it is this world of things which they internalize and represent back in their artwork.

A Yidinji perspective Ian Jensen’s work is different from other artistic styles in the studio. Ian is a Yidinji man who is knowledgeable about traditional shield designs and patterns among the Rainforest or Bama peoples surrounding Cairns. Before exploring Ian’s expression of his Yidinji culture, a few notes on the spelling and terms used are in order. Contemporary spellings as well as their meanings are presented here as given to me by the artist. Ian’s extensive research into various archives and his documentation of oral histories is impressive and was enthusiastically shared with me. It is published here with his permission and represented as requested.



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Some of these terms are in opposition to previously published understandings of Yidinji culture. One example is Ursula McConnell’s understanding of dúmbau or scorpion (1935: 50) as well as her spelling of Yidinji as ‘Yidindyi’ (1935: 49). As will be demonstrated below, a more nuanced understanding of the scorpion has emerged from this research, something McConnell would have foreseen herself. She wrote, ‘My information regarding the Yidindyi is scanty’ (1935: 51), and Ian’s depth of knowledge adds much to our appreciation of his artistic expression. According to Ian, ‘the main concept with Yidinji or Rainforest people is not dots but shapes, like triangles, diamonds. The shapes:  you see that geometric shapes in the shield designs. … That’s why all my designs are based on shapes.’1 For Ian, the shield – or bigunu – design is one which he returns to again and again. A rendering of a Yidinji shield design can be seen in Figure 6 as discussed in Chapter 5. In Figure 25, Ian’s painting has the same ovoid shape of the shield, but the patterns of the shield break outside of their confines and fill the canvas with shape and colour. Ian’s shield series are in fact true abstractions as he plays again and again with the diamond/triangle pattern throughout the picture plane. For Ian, art production is not about representing a thing but rather a concept and that concept is a Yidinji aesthetic. In other words, there is a reason for Ian to produce art in this way which is not the case for the other artists in the studio. Abstraction has a specific purpose and meaning which Ian employs to express his particular identity and heritage. In asking about Bigunu, Ian handed me a sheet of paper. It was a document he created specifically for explaining the symbolism behind the design. Ian’s writing, always eclectic, even in emails, is as follows along with his semantic coding:

THE ‘bigunu’ SHIELD Traditional Abstract & Symmetrical-Designs are Proudly Displayed on the ‘bigunu’ > Rainforest – Shield by the ‘Yidinji People’, whom associated themselves with the Fauna & Flora of the Rainforest whereby it simply meant > Connection to Country that gave a Sense of Belonging. The Traditional Designs on the ‘Yidinji  –Warriors’ Shield, actually Describes & Identifies Oneself on what & where he comes from >> COUNTRY >> it simply Incorporates One’s > IDENTITY & PLACE OF ORIGIN [Tribe > Clan-Group]   [Location} That Distinguishes Ourselves from OTHER Local Indigenous Groups Throughout Regional Cairns & Surrounding District.2

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Ian’s eclectic writing style is in itself significant. As the art historian Hillary Chute observes in her analysis of graphic narratives, ‘this ruffling of the visual surface … slows one down and also works to establish an extrasemantic visual rhythm through the presentation of words’ (2010: 111). Ian explains the importance of traditional areas as they are associated with totemic animals but what he demonstrates in this creative display are his ideas on how the connection between culture and identity and heritage cannot be untangled. The bolding of the words ‘Yidinji-Warriors’ marks the shields through a specific form of semantic meaning – what Chute calls extrasemantic and which here acts as a visual clue to how Ian wants his words to be read. The shield designs for him are the ultimate in not only Aboriginal identity but specifically a Yidinji-Aboriginal identity. Ian has many such designs based around the concept of Bigunu and he fluctuates between labelling a work Bigunu and labelling it Yidinji. For Ian, the artefact of the shield and its various shapes are as one with his Aboriginal identity, and he specifically links the representation of that identity with abstraction and symmetrical designs. Ian’s paintings of shields are abstraction of the traditional Bama shields which are in turn abstractions of the scorpion and scrubfowl found in nature. The scorpion and scrubfowl are important elements of the natural world to the Yidinji people. For example, scorpions, or ‘djumbun’ (Hormurus waigiensis), have triangle patterns on their heads and such triangles are found on Yidinji shields made during pre-contact times. This tradition informs Ian’s use of triangles in his artwork. One cannot escape the fact that scorpions figure heavily in Yidinji cosmology. Ian explains this further: [scorpion < ‘djumbun’ > witchetty grub] The visual narrative of ‘djumbun’ is a cultural concept based on the traditional ‘Yidinji’ story of ‘metamorphism’, whereby the scorpion and the witchetty grub are one and the same. The ‘Yidinji-Tribe’ uses the idea that depicts the witchetty grub metamorphose into a moth or [as] the Yidinji people believe a scorpion. Customary the scorpion is a symbol of the preparation, development and initiation of the young ‘YidinjiWarriors’ into manhood. So culturally ‘djumbun’, based on traditional beliefs regard that BOTH the scorpion and witchetty grub are often found in the same places, the Yidinji people believed they were two different Stages of the one Life Cycle.3

Yidinji belief systems see the scorpion as a creature of change and even the same as the witchetty grub (Endoxyla leucomochla). The triangle is equally



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as multivalent and is semantically full of references to the natural world. The scrubhens (orange-footed scrubfowl, Megapodius reinwardt) lay eggs in a triangle-shaped nest the males create for them. Ian often includes a triangle as a symbol for both the scorpion (djumbunji) and the scrubhen’s (djarruga) ancestral journey which resulted in Bunda djarruga Murrgu or the Hill of the Scrubhen Nest. Ian describes the scrubfowl as both a symbol in art and in the natural world as exampled by Walsh’s Pyramid, a local mountain near Cairns. ‘Djarrugun’ [Commonly known as Walsh’s Pyramid] GORDONVALE [‘gubuda’ > fighting ground] Bunda ‘djarruga’ Murrgu [Hill of the Scrub Hen Nest] IS A Place of Cultural Significance The Yidinji-Tribe > Clan Groups All have similar Spiritual & Cultural Connection With the Traditional ‘DREAMTIME’ Story of the The Ancestral Journey of ‘djarruga’ the Scrub Hen And It’s Nesting Place > the ‘Pyramid’ ‘DREAMTIME’ simply reflects the unique Cultural-Embodiment between One’s own ‘Spiritual & Physical’ Relationship in ‘Connection’ to Our Country >4

All of these meanings  – of the scorpion as stages in the Yidinji life cycle, as the scrubhen and her ancestral journeys across the land  – are imbued in the symbol of the triangle. Indeed, the scrubfowl has a triangle-shaped head, further layering the bird with iconographical symbolism. These meanings enforce Ian’s desire to focus on shapes as semantically full design elements that express his Yidinji heritage as well as his artistic style. The focus on shapes leads the discussion to Ian’s most prolific area – digital works. In his Creation Series, Ian uses a technique akin to a Spirograph to create a series of shapes which reflects how he sees the world (Figure 26). The shapes are a tribute to his Yidinji heritage, but the style is very much his own. With regard to Creation Series #1, Ian writes,

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The Creation  – Series simply reflects our unique Cultural Embodiment between one’s own ‘Spiritual & Physical’ Relationship in connection with the Heavenly Beginnings of ‘LIFE’ itself – the UNIVERSE. [That gives the existence of ‘LIFE’ – a meaning & purpose > a sense of belonging].5

In this statement, Ian is once again creating a connection between culture, belonging and an individual sense of self. Almost all of Ian’s works were abstracted in this way and communicated according to Yidinji cultural practices and especially to land. Significantly, Ian made a point to dismiss dots specifically like Heather did. Unlike other artists in Chapter 7 who use dots as an index of their First Nations identity, Ian purposefully moved away from dots as markers of Indigeneity and he is not the only Yidinji artist to do this. Since 2010, the Cairns City Council undertook a revitalization project which included a large outdoor installation of oversized Yidinji shields. Created by the artist Paul Bong, these five shields are the first permanent, visible signs of acknowledgement by the city of the Traditional Owners of the area. According to Bong, ‘I hope when people see them, they take away that there was a people living here in harmony, that there is a culture here and to have respect for that’ (Mounter 2017 [online]). Bong notes that the shields, although used in times of warfare, are now there to protect the city and are symbols of welcome (ibid.). Like Ian’s work, the shields are based on ancestral objects currently held in museums and which can only be read as classically Yidinji.

Torres Strait cultural content Torres Strait Islanders have fought and worked hard for recognition of their unique culture in the mainstream. It has been a long battle, with many Islanders rankled by the ‘second class’ ranking felt though the naming standard of government agencies which read Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander. Academic treatment of Islander art is not as developed as that of their mainland counterparts and most information about Torres Strait Islander art history is in museum exhibition publications (see Gab Titui Cultural Centre 2008, 2009a, 2009b, 2010 and many others; Newstead 2001; O’Connell 2007, 2008). Like the Dreamings exhibition for Aboriginal artists, Islander artists also had a key exhibition that helped improve public understandings. As Demozay writes, In 2000, a major exhibition and catalogue produced by the Cairns Regional Gallery provided a watershed in appreciation of both historical and contemporary



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Torres Strait Islander art. Finally, in a coherent and spectacular way, Ilan Pasin (this is our way) gave Torres Strait Islander a much higher profile. The touring exhibition brought that voice forcefully to the attention of both the broader Australian community and outside Australia. (2006: 29)

Since 2000, there have been several exhibitions and the careers of Alick Tipoti, Dennis Nona, Brian Robinson and Ken Thaiday, Sr grew on an international scale. Previous exhibitions would pale in comparison though to the major programme held in Brisbane in 2011. The Torres Strait Islands was an ambitious project, coordinated across the Queensland Art Gallery, State Library of Queensland, Queensland Museum and the Queensland Performing Arts Centre (Queensland Art Gallery 2011) and included objects from those diverse collections as well as objects from overseas museums. Works from the Alfred Cort Haddon collection were on display for the first time in decades and sometimes for the first time ever. Haddon collected over 1,400 objects from the Torres Strait (Kaus 2008: 299), including the eastern and western islands during the late nineteenth century (see Haddon 1935). This major exhibition programme by the Queensland Galleries Libraries Archives and Museums (GLAM) sector was instrumental in highlighting Torres Strait material culture on a large scale. It still came decades after similar exhibitions focusing on Aboriginal traditions. With the publication of the catalogue, a much richer understanding of Torres Strait Islander art history is now available. Haddon documented much of his expedition to the Torres Strait Islands and published his accounts of Islander cultural and material life in the early twentieth century (Haddon 1935). Torres Strait Islander material culture is located in collections all over the world (Cooper 1989; Kaus 2004), with the majority of the oldest and most unique objects held overseas (Kaus 2004: 96–9). This is in part due to the collection efforts of Haddon who brought back to London thousands of objects from the Torres Strait. The Cambridge University’s Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology has the single largest portion of the Haddon collection with over 1,200 objects (Kaus 2004: 98). Although The Torres Strait Islands brought much of this collection together, such a display is rare for Islanders to experience. These objects are accessible by physically visiting the museums overseas or through select publications (e.g. Moore 1984, 1989; Wilson 1988, 1993; Herle et  al. 1998; Philp 2001). This means that for Torres Strait Islanders living in Australia, many of their cultural objects are available to them only in books. Tommy explained to me that ‘Torres Strait art is mostly influenced by documentation’.6 There are several examples of artists using the Haddon

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collection. Cambridge Museum senior curator Anita Herle writes, ‘a hundred years later, the Expedition’s results remain an important resource for the emergence of a strong contemporary Islander identity’ (1998: 78). Established Torres Strait Islander artists like Dennis Nona, Alick Tipoti and Billy Missi have travelled to England to view the material culture Haddon collected. The trio have been quoted as saying that the collection has been pivotal in developing their own style (Newstead 2001:  6). However, established artists do make a point of grounding their practice within their own circle of influence. As Bruce McLean notes, Torres Strait artists ‘liaise extensively with elders and heads of their communities to reproduce epic ancestral narratives, while others take these stories from books’ (2011: 77–9). Billy Missi drew upon his personal experience as a diver and many of his works depict the elements of the natural world. In personal conversations, he explained how he avoided traditional stories of respect for cultural protocols.7 Tommy explained this process of Torres Strait Islander cultural knowledge more generally. Growing up in the Torres Strait, elders don’t sit down and show you symbols or designs. They might but it’s not like sit you down and show you like the Northern Territory. The people of the Central Desert went through the process of teaching the kids. They sat down in the sand and drew patterns for them, teaching them all the patterns and stuff. … As I remember when we were young, I saw this man paint a drum for a feasting. He painted it with enamel paint from the shelf. We watched him but he never really explained to us what the designs were and everything like that. He just painted it. So what I’m saying is that to me, Torres Strait arts and designs … The majority of how we learn, how Torres Strait Islanders learn, is from Haddon.8

Inside the studio, Torres Strait Islander students were at pains to learn more about their cultural heritage. During my interviews with Islander artists, I began to notice a common response when I asked questions about specific images and artefacts. Artists generally knew the language name of an artefact but when I asked more probing questions, the answer was almost always the same: ‘Ask Tommy.’ It was only when the older Torres Strait Islanders began answering this way, referring to Tommy as an ‘elder’ when he was in fact years younger, that I realized something different was happening. The most common way to acquire understanding of artefacts and material objects in the studio was through books. Everyone in the studio was familiar with Alfred Cort Haddon’s anthropological and ethnological research in the Torres Strait and within the ATSI studio, there was always a copy of Lindsay Wilson’s Thathilgaw Emeret Lu:  A Handbook of Traditional Torres Strait Islands Material Culture (1988).



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Tommy had a special place in the studio among both Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander students. Firstly, he was the only student to have a bachelor’s degree. Tommy had extensive experience as a digital artist and his knowledge of computers was respected throughout the studio as well as his artistic abilities. He is incredibly well-read concerning a large spectrum of topics, but he is especially fascinated and concerned about Torres Strait history and culture. It is this knowledge which made him an important point of contact for cultural knowledge by other students. Tommy has spent years studying the material in the Haddon collection and criticizes those who simply ‘look at the pretty pictures’. For him, understanding Haddon and the written material is paramount to finding interesting designs and patterns. In this way, Tommy had become the source for Torres Strait Islander cultural knowledge within the studio. The removal of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders from their ancestral homelands to other areas, either through forced removal or secondary pressures such as economic opportunities, has demanded new techniques and skills in acquiring cultural knowledge. The tradition of elders sitting down and talking to youths, explaining protocols and reinforcing cultural norms was never really a tradition. Instead, Islanders go to their elders and ask questions about cultural protocols as they come up. It is a continuous conversation. As Tommy told me, ‘Culture is what you are now. It’s how you are now.’ The how of contemporary Islander life ways is complicated by many factors. It is not surprising then that within the studio, the most important issue was being able to research and answer questions which the artistic process demanded. Tommy takes his position in the studio very seriously. If I’m responsible for say interpreting Torres Strait art, I’m also conscious of polluting it too much. … Like an island story, I’m careful not to add too much images or influence into it. Because it totally changes the story. Plus it’s my version anyway. Torres Strait culture is an oral culture. So when one person tells a story, it’s their version. And when that person tells the story it’s their version. So the true version can be questioned. All the myths and legends, there are two or three versions. If someone were to claim one version as the truth, you just can’t. It’s someone else’s version. That’s how it is with oral culture.9

Tommy’s artwork is a reflection of his careful study of Haddon’s writings and the descriptions which go with each work attest to this knowledge. For example, Tommy has produced several images of the Kab Kar, which he described as:

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an energetic dance form performed by Eastern Torres Strait Islanders. This dance form [original form] was outlawed on Darnley Island by missionaries because of its power to seduce, mesmerise, hypnotise and bring the spiritual essence of the dance to the dancing ground. The dance was accompanied by the ekoc (ghost crying) singing and the hypnotic beat of the music. Kab Kar is still performed today but its full form and power [is] suppressed.10

Tommy’s digital work Kab Kar is illustrated in Figure 27. The depiction of the work has a mysterious quality to it – the faded figures in the background, the dark ‘haze’ which surrounds them and the replacement of a human’s head with the dhari, or feathered headdress, transform this image from a realistic to surrealistic image. This approach elevates the figure from the mundane to the spiritual. Torres Strait dance is filled with symbolism and cultural meaning but nothing is more iconic for Islanders than the dhari. The dhari marks Islanders as Islanders. The dhari originated from the eastern islands, originally used in ceremonies and sacred dances. The dhari is now used throughout the Torres Strait as a shared symbol of Islander identity and unity. In 1992, Bernard Namok, Sr won a competition to design a flag that would represent all the islands and a dhari was chosen as the central design element (AIATSIS 2017 [online]). As Tommy told me, ‘all Torres Strait Islander should feel in their heart that the dhari is their symbol of identity’.11 Today, the dhari is worn during specific, traditional dances and as dance is a theme Tommy returns to again and again, the dhari also appears again and again (Figure 29). The dhari is a symbol for all Islanders. Peter (see Figure 15, above the turtle’s head and Figure 23, above the seahorse’s head) and Charlie (Figure 18) both include the headdress in their artworks. Although the dhari is the most iconic of Torres Strait Islander material culture, they are not the only one. Tommy once gave me his copy of Ion Idriess’s Drums of Mer ([1947] 1890) to read. He told me that although it was a work of fiction, it was drawn from many traditional customs and beliefs of the eastern Torres Strait Islands. Tommy explained that the focus of the book is on eastern traditions and wanted me to understand the differences between the western traditions which is an important part of Torres Strait identity construction. There is a difference in artistic practices between eastern and western islands and Tommy is trying to draw these distinctions out. In Drums of Mer, the Zogo Le are powerful men and Tommy describes their significance in connection to his image Zogo Le ra Pone (Eyes of the Magic Man) (Figure 28).



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It is said that the Zogo Le knew exactly where a canoe or canoes were by the map of the strait made by arranging bailer shells. The Zogo Le would employ the service of the wonepol (gecko) to show him where the canoe was by running to the shell and climbing on it to show the Zogo Le which island/s the canoe/s were at. This way, the Zogo Le of the Malo Bomai knew what was going on in the Strait. The masks are of Zogo Le communicating with each other by telepathy shown by the radiating lines. The circular liens are to depict radar pulses showing telepathy and sensitivity to the spiritual world. The white headband is to signify the wisdom and knowledge of the Zogo Le.12

The Zogo Le are represented not as men but as masks floating in a dizzying space of concentric circles and lines. The aids in divination, the geckos, are placed around the masks in a frame of translucent blues and yellows. The reduction of the men into masks elevates the image into something beyond the now and into another realm. Tommy uses artefacts like the masks in Zogo Le ra Pone to take the viewer on a spiritual journey by transcending the human body from the everyday. It also serves to illustrate and promote his own knowledge of Torres Strait Islander culture. Tommy’s works played a lot with concepts of Torres Strait culture. As already stated, his passion was dance. Many of his paintings and the wood carvings he did outside of the studio were of dancing and included garments, headdresses and figures in movement. In one of his paintings, seen on the back cover of this book, Tommy depicts the Weres Segur, a dance showing how sardines (tup or cos) were caught in the traditional way by using a sardine scoop or weris. Tommy describes how the dancer with the stick or water beater chases the sardines towards the dancer with the weris who then scoops it up and puts them in a basket.13 Unlike the dhari, where everyone across the Strait could identify with it and see it as a symbol for all the islands, the weris is a uniquely eastern Islander cultural symbol. At a gallery show, I noticed Billy Missi admiring one of Tommy’s works which included a weris. I asked Billy if he liked the work and he said yes and told me it was ‘an eastern island thing. We don’t use them in the western islands’. As such, he has never depicted them in his own artworks. In Figure 32, Eddie makes the weris the primary focus of his painting. Sardines spill into the scoop while sardine tails frame the picture. In this work, Eddie is not only putting his Torres Strait identity on the canvas but his eastern Islander identity as well. The weris becomes an important symbol to convey Islander identities but, for Eddie, this symbol has a limited semantic meaning dependent on its medium. For example, Weris (Figure 32) was exhibited at the Cairns Art Gallery for the

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diploma students’ end of year show. Previous to this, when Eddie and I  were discussing my research, he offered to make me a weris for my anthropological collection. ‘So you can show the people in Canberra’, he told me. When I received the weris, I was impressed with its construction. It was made of bamboo and painted blue with a black fish tail design along the handle. I  admired it and asked if Eddie would consider displaying this at the gallery. He replied, ‘No, that’s not for a gallery’, clearly making a distinction between an actual weris as inappropriate for display while a painting of one was fit to hang on the gallery walls. A painting of a weris was more in line with what Eddie felt the atmosphere of the gallery was most suited for and had meaning in that medium. Content and its relation to myths and legends is not the only marker of Torres Strait culture inside the studio. As dots are to the Central Desert and triangles are to the Yidinji, Torres Strait Islanders have their own range of design elements that are rooted in their own unique history and cultural identity. Some elements can link back to certain islands, customs and legends which can belong to certain family groups and can be quite contentious if used inappropriately. Overall, mark making on ‘masks, headdresses, drums, canoes and hunting tools has proven its versatility’ (Laver 2010: 15). When reviewing the artworks of established Torres Strait Islander artists such as Billy Missi, Dennis Nona, Joey Laifoo, Brian Robinson and Alick Tipoti, one can see common design elements such as V-shapes, fish teeth, C-shapes, E-shapes and fish tails. Collectively, these design elements are called Minaral (Alfonso et al. 2001; O’Connell 2008) and the local art centre on Moa Island is called Ngalmun Lagau Minaral or Our Island Designs (Gab Titui Cultural Centre 2009b [online]). Janette Laver describes the Torres Strait Islander patterning as ‘marks such as elaborate incised and painted decorations of diamond shapes, triangles, concentric inverted U’s, fretting, chevrons, conventional star shapes and stylised human and animal outlines’ (2010: 15). Tommy’s use of some of the items is illustrated in Masked Dancers (Figure 29). One of the most significant design elements for Torres Strait Islander art is pattern referred to as ‘E-shape’. The E-shape has shown up in countless images of Torres Strait works and is said to come from the shape of crocodile skin.14 Established artists say this design comes directly from the Haddon material and is a common element found in Torres Strait prints.15 The E-shape can be seen in the swirls on either side of the dancers. Dharis line the upper and lower registers of the image which can also be seen as symbols of fish tails while netting and weaves are seen in the backgrounds of the dancers. Not all elements actually have a story or cultural meaning and are instead used as a design aesthetic (infill) rather than an expression of cultural



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knowledge. As discussed in Chapter  7, empty space was not the norm and the desire to fill up that space made for a wide range of creative solutions. However, cultural affiliation through the use of design elements can certainly be attributed in some cases such as in Tommy’s Masked Dancers. The fish teeth and E-shapes have been sourced to the Haddon collection and therefore have a higher level of cultural capital than other design elements. Artists like Alick Tipoti, Dennis Nona and Brian Robinson have employed these designs frequently, aiding in the designs’ reputation as hallmarks of Torres Strait Islander art (Alfonso et al. 2001; O’Connell 2007; Gab Titui Cultural Centre 2008; O’Connell 2008; Gab Titui Cultural Centre 2009a; Brinkman 2010; Gab Titui Cultural Centre 2010; Mclean 2011). The use and placement of these designs are firmly rooted in an Islander aesthetic which is commonly drawn from examinations of the Haddon material. Even if the individual elements lack an associated meaning, collectively, they are heavy with Islander value as a reflection of their cultural priorities in representing their worldview through their art.

Kaurareg cultural content Torres Strait Islanders used Minaral in their artworks as markers of their unique First Nations identity but a few of these elements were used by an artist that identified as Aboriginal. His story is a unique one. In his own descriptions, Leon Namai grew up believing he was Torres Strait Islander and only later in life did he realize he was Aboriginal. In his words: I grew up in Weipa. I thought we were sort of Islanders living on the mainland with Aboriginal people. The main thing for me now, sort of going through TAFE, is finding out who I really am. And just doing this course here, I’ve done a bit of research and found out I’m not really Islander. I mean, I am Islander over a period of time but if I trace it right back to where it all begins, we’re actually Aboriginals. There was a big thing in Weipa because everyone knew my dad was an Islander and my mum was Aboriginal. So we used to get called Islanders, ah yeah. Island fella, you don’t belong here. All this sort of stuff. We always knew we were Aboriginals because of our mother. But we just sort of thought, we’re mixed. That’s why I’m trying to make it … make it known that it’s only over a period of time that we’ve been Torres Strait Islanders. If I trace it back to my grandfather’s grandfather on the island of Prince of Wales, they were actually Aboriginals.16

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Leon had both Islander and Aboriginal heritages but was stigmatized as an Islander among his peers in Weipa, a remote, Australian mainland town, on the west coast of Cape York. The dilemma or confusion is due to how Australians see this region. There is a small cluster of islands near the Australian mainland that include Muralag (Prince of Wales Island), Waibene (Thursday Island), Nurupai (Horn) and Kiriri (Hammond Island).17 These islands are the traditional homelands of the Kaurareg or Muralag people (Sharp 1992: 3). Waibene is the administrative hub for the entire Torres Strait Islands and Muralag, Nurupai and Kiriri come under its auspices. The people residing on these three islands are culturally, linguistically and historically Torres Strait Islanders but they are often written about as an Aboriginal group of people (see Sharp 1992; Queensland Government 2018). Although the Kaurareg occupy a very real and physical space, they find themselves in a liminal one as well, between western demarcations of space (mainland vs islands) and between western concepts of identity (Aboriginal vs Islander). As Nonie Sharp writes, ‘the identity of the Kaurareg as an ethnic-cultural entity (itself composed of a number of totemic groups), [and is] quite distinct from neighbouring groupings’ (1992: 105). The Kaurareg, like many First Nations peoples all over the world, created linkages and trade connections across their region. They ‘formed alliances with other groups … in the Northern Peninsula Area … and even as far away as Moa [Island]’ (Sharp 1992: 105). Although some important myths were shared with other Torres Strait Islander groups, the Kaurareg have cultural artefacts and traditions that are uniquely their own. The nuances of the Northern Peninsula Area – that area of far north Australia where the mainland meets the ocean and international waters  – is not well understood among the wider Australian public. Leon’s story stems from this misunderstanding. Leon claims his Aboriginal heritage but not through his Aboriginal mother but through a greater and more nuanced understanding of his Kaurareg heritage. The works Leon produces are a reflection of this new orientation of identity. In Figure 30, Leon has created a print which depicts a figure holding a spear and the special double-edged sword which is unique to the Kaurareg. In the Kaurareg language, this sword is called baidamal baba and is a weapon carved from wood and ‘studded with shark’s teeth’ (Sharp 1992: 105). Leon uses the sword as the representation of his Kaurareg identity and it is repeated behind and below the figure and the infill patterns follow the forms of the sword as well. Leon pointed out to me a type of design element he created which he feels is reflective of the life on Nurupai and Muralag Islands – the wave curl. He draws upon some of the Minaral elements such as the E-shape and fish teeth design but he is not afraid of creating something new.



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During the 2010 school year, Leon experimented with many forms of representation. As he told me: At the moment my art’s all over the place – I’m doing all sorts of stuff. Mainly just trying to separate the land animals from the sea animals – distinguishing the Islander and the Aboriginal things. With what I’m studying at the moment, trying to research about this generation where we were Aboriginals in the first place, that’s going to come down later in the track as I develop in the art world.18

Leon felt that he was Aboriginal and strove in his artwork to demonstrate not only his knowledge of his Aboriginality but also his artistic ability. However, his artistic expressions are also rooted in Islander forms. For Leon, it was extremely important to make a distinct Kaurareg visual vocabulary he could draw upon and use in his works. Leon felt there were major differences between the Kaurareg and other Torres Strait islands and through his artworks, he attempts to draw out those differences. He uses Aboriginal as a shorthand to make these distinctions clear. Leon identifies as an Aboriginal artist but the design elements found in his works include an Islander aesthetic such as the E-shape and fish teeth. This is because artists do not paint according to a label but they paint from their experiences. Rae O’Connell described the prints from Torres Strait artists as ‘complex, often geometric, highly expressive designs and motifs which generally form the background of patterning of the print, over which a main object or several objects are placed’ (2007: 10). Leon is certainly working in this manner and, in doing so, blurs the lines between an Islander and Aboriginal identity. In point of fact, those lines should be blurred. That there would exist a hard distinction between Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders living in such close proximity to each other is naïve and part of the colonial mindset that is used to erase First Nations peoples and identities.

An Islander aesthetic? In many ways, Leon skewed the content analysis results by identifying as Aboriginal and not Islander. This is because Leon’s style of art fell in line with the aesthetics dominated by artists from the Torres Strait and not the subject matter and stylistic representations of the other Aboriginal students. This skewing is demonstrated through two examples: masks and what I am calling ‘dense patterning’. In exploring these examples, it is clear that despite having to

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or preferring to identify as one First Nations group or the other, when it comes to creating artworks, artists are tapping into something else entirely. Masks were full of particular forms of cultural content and Islanders were the only students in the studio to depict them. In Figure 31, Leon depicts the mythic story of the seven blind brothers who would go out fishing only to have their catch stolen by an evil sea witch. Leon depicts the brothers in a series of repeated masks with the witch’s sinister hands closing in on their catch. These masks stand in for realistic heads and bodies and add visual interest as well as conveying some of the details of the legend which he obtained from reading about the life of Barbara Crawford Thompson  – a woman who was shipwrecked and then lived on the islands for many years when rescued by the Kaurareg people (see Warren 2004). The reduction of the figures into a series of masks is a trope employed by other Torres Strait artists – as already mentioned in the analysis of Tommy’s works but also seen in established artists such as Dennis Nona and Alick Tipoti (see Robert Steele Gallery 2009). This was a trope not utilized among the Aboriginal artists in the studio and could be read as an Islander form of aesthetic. Tommy produced several images of masks and, like a lot of Torres Strait Islander masks, includes feathers as embellishments. Feathers and birds in general have important cultural significance for Islanders. The giant bird Kusa Kap, born from an Islander woman, taught people how to eat dugong – a major food staple for the western islands (Haddon 1890a: 49–53). Eastern Torres Strait hunters were said to decorate their heads ‘with feathers of the cassowary and of the Torres Straits pigeon’ (Haddon 1890b: 183). In another legend, a warrior stuck a ‘bunch of cassowary feathers’ into his belt and began to dance like a bird after a bird showed him where water was (Haddon 1890b: 188). As noted in the catalogue to Malu Minar  – the first major exhibition of Torres Strait Islander art  – ‘turtle-shell masks and headdresses are the most recognisable examples of art from the Torres Strait, having been collected by numerous museum and art institutions throughout the world’ (Brinkman 2010: 14). Masks then are an important marker of Torres Strait cultural content. Tommy’s masks are based on historical artefacts collected by Haddon with traditional designs such as zigzags and half-circle motifs. Referring back to Masked Dancers (Figure 29), Tommy outlines the significance of the masks in dance. Dancers wear masks to protect themselves from the spiritual world. It is a disguise hiding their true identity when performing rituals. Dancers also are endowed with the character or totemic spirit of a certain mask which has been invoked with by magic, thus only certain persons can wear them and perform their intent rituals.



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Masks then are significant artefacts in artworks for Islander artists and the works by Leon and Tommy illustrate how they are incorporated. Another example of this Islander aesthetic is what I  am calling ‘dense patterning’. Dense patterning is defined by the use of five or more design elements and/or artwork with a minimum amount of undecorated space. Looking at the works of Ian (Figure 25), Pellista (Figure 8) or Lynelle (Figure 9), one can see either a minimum of design elements used or clean, unadorned areas of the picture plane. Works by Islanders like Peter (Figures 15, and 23), Tommy (Figures 28 and 29), and Leon (Figures 30 and 31) have filled the surface of the medium with designs of a dizzying array. Lines, zig-zags, weaves, nested lines, cross-hatching, E-shapes, C-shapes, and a variety of concentric shapes fill almost every inch of the picture plan in all the works cited. Many of their works are so crammed with Minaral that it is difficult to make out the animals and words that are being depicted. Peter’s Diving Down (Figure 23) is filled with sharks and shells, radiating around a delicately rendered seahorse but there are also other hidden gems within the careful linework. These works demand time on the viewer to ‘see’ all there is to see. Tommy’s and Leon’s works hide the figure(s) in a mesh of designs. This hiding through decorative elements merges the figure(s) into the background as either part of the landscape (Leon’s work, Figure 30) or part of the radiating energy from the dance (Tommy’s work, Figure 29). This type of dense patterning is the hallmark of Torres Strait Islander art but I would argue that it is a hallmark of an overall island aesthetic. It should be noted that the one Aboriginal artist to use dense patterning, besides Leon, was Allan. In his works Cultural Identity: Totems (Figure 6) and Lizard (Figure 21), Allan demonstrates a leaning towards dense patterning in his backgrounds and in the radiating design elements encircling the lizard. It should also be noted that Allan proudly claims his Vanuatu Islander heritage. With the use of dense patterning, he is claiming this identity on multiple levels as well as contributing to the Islander aesthetic. Why this is the case will be discussed more in Chapter 9, using Belting’s concept of an image archive but it is clear that the works artists produce are indeed a truly personal reflection even as they are also a connection to the collective.

A final note on the content analysis The analysis of cultural content is the first part of understanding what is Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander art in the Cairns region in order to understand how

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fluid those definitions are. The findings of the content analysis make up in part the evidence for examining ideologies of culture and how they play out in the visual material as well as how art and identity production are linked. Who you identify as does not always dictate what you produce as art production in general is crafted by outside and inside determinants acting on artists. The content analysis was designed to go beyond what artists simply said about their artworks and to delve into some of the acts of mark making artists may not have been aware of. Tommy and Ian certainly were aware of how their cultural heritage informed their practices but they were also the most vocal critics of the arts industry in Cairns. Tommy lamented the lack of cultural protocols in Torres Strait art and how some artists took advantage of mainstream ignorance in order to promote their own careers. Ian talked about the issues of nepotism among some institutions which favoured artworks from regions outside of Cairns, resulting in making local and traditional Yidinji artists peripheral to some major exhibition and fairs which took place on their lands. Leon was concerned about how the Kaurereg were under-represented and misunderstood by the general Australian population. This analysis has shown that there are some design elements and artefacts as well as artistic styles which can be considered ‘Aboriginal’ or ‘Islander’. As seen in the works of Tommy and Ian, these forms are used to promote and illustrate aspects of cultural heritage. However, there are those same forms which are used by artists which are outside these definitions. I see the works of Leon as expressing a form of island-ness – reflecting his own concepts of Indigeneity through his own personal experiences. All the artists may have to identify as an Aboriginal or Islander through the processes they have come to understand the label, but they cannot escape the images and elements which they are comfortable with in expressing that identity. In some ways, the artists have it exactly right – why identify as an ‘Aboriginal’ or ‘Islander’ artist? Why not just an artist? Chapter  7 and this chapter used the content analysis method as a way of teasing out how TAFE First Nations students approached the use of so-called pan-Aboriginal motifs and how they infused their artworks with content based on their own unique identities. The concern with this method is that the results are interpreted as either a proscription or a prescription of First Nations identity; this would be a gross misuse of the method. None of these results should be read as limitations or constraints upon artists and how they should be. The results should instead be read as evidence of the types of questions and concerns First Nations artists face in Far North Queensland. Furthermore, as will be discussed in the last chapter, the use of these design elements and the application of



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cultural content should be seen as the beginning of the conversation and not the whole conversation.

Notes 1 Personal communication, 14 October 2010. 2 Ibid. 3 Personal communication, 17 July 2018. 4 Ibid. 5 Ibid. 6 That some Islanders learn their cultural heritage through books should never be taken as these Islander people being ‘less’ but, rather, should be viewed as the results of violent colonial contact, displacement and a legacy of draconian policies heaped upon Islanders. Creating hierarchies of ‘real’/‘unreal’, ‘authentic’/‘inauthentic’ and ‘traditional’/‘non-traditional’ feed into colonial narratives of erasure and should be avoided. 7 Personal communication, 10 April 2010. 8 Personal communication, 22 August 2011. 9 Ibid. 10 Ibid. 11 Personal communication, 2 May 2014. 12 Typed handout, authored by Tommy, dated August 2010. 13 Personal communication, 29 April 2011. 14 Tommy Pau, personal communication, 22 August 2010. 15 Billy Missi, personal communication, 10 April 2010. 16 Personal communication, 13 July 2010. 17 Spellings for these islands are taken from Sharp (1992: Map 1). 18 Personal communication, 13 July 2010, emphasis added.

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Culture and identity are so entangled in Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander self-reflections that it is hard to talk about one without having to tackle the other. Visual arts are the material manifestations of this entanglement. Artworks reflect upon and speak to and about issues surrounding the identity/culture connection and are only by-products of being an Aboriginal or Islander artist in a world where there is an already well-developed sense of what that being should be. Going against or even brushing up against this preconception creates different forms of exchanges which can have positive and negative effects. This book brings out four major themes in relation to First Nations art practices: the complexity of the culture concept in Far North Queensland, the fear of mainstreaming, the crisis of identification and representation, and the influence of the market. All four of these themes inform and reflect back onto each other, culminating in the artworks examined throughout the chapters. The culture concept, as it has been used inside the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander arts studio, focused on a form of high culture practices such as language, visual arts, music and dance. The lived lives of First Nations people – their mannerisms, values placed on family and relatedness and personal experiences – were not given space for recognition and expression. The range of styles and motifs in the personal art journals of the students illustrated a far more varied form of First Nations being than what was displayed on the gallery walls. Images of human bodies, landscapes and ‘Indigenized’ comics all suggest a desire to go beyond depictions of artefacts, legends and ancestral beings or concepts. Additionally, the rendering of the journal works is generally done in a more realistic or naturalistic manner utilizing traditional art studio tropes such as horizon lines, foreshortening, shading and careful line and brush work. Drawings and paintings in the journals typically avoided the flat, floating objects found in the gallery works where students actively sought out a style which resonated with a preconception of what they thought of as ‘Indigenous art’.

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The expression of the culture concept expected by the TAFE curriculum was unchallenged by any critiques from either students or instructors. This is due in part to the understaffing of the ATSI arts programme which stretched the instructors to the limit and who were unable to spend more than 30 minutes a day inside the studio. The main factor, however, in encouraging the focus on language, legends, music and dance was the fear of mainstreaming or losing the studio to non-Indigenous interests. As Elaine asked me, what would make the ATSI arts programme an ATSI-only programme if not for the cultural content? The cultural content preserved the programme as it was and helped keep it from being open to non-Indigenous students. This is in large part because the cultural content is seen by outsiders as First Nations property and thus not available to just anybody. As discussed, the first music and dance programmes at the TAFE were First Nations only as they were funded by Indigenous grants for First Nations people to meet their desires and needs. Those programmes have since been mainstreamed – they have been lost. The ATSI arts programme is the oldest ATSI programme on the TAFE campus and students have a pride in this which energizes them to work to keep the programme as it is. This fragile state does not keep the students from critiquing the delivery of the units but it does put pressure on the students as a whole to continue to produce ‘cultural’ works. Again, this division between high culture and the culture of the everyday has created a situation where students must suppress the side of them which does not conform to popular conceptions of Indigeneity. In developing artworks which have a cultural content, a looming question remains: Which culture? It is not easy to identify as both Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander as the results in the studio show. Only two out of thirty-seven students identified as both despite the fact that more than fifteen students claimed a heritage stemming from both. As Leon’s experience shows, there is a practice of identifying as one identity or the other despite the fact that it was well known that Leon was both Islander and Aboriginal. This crisis of representation is common in First Nations arts in Cairns where both groups are present and active and with popular forms of cultural expression independent of the other group. It is not enough to simply be a First Nations artist  – you have to be either Aboriginal or Islander. Issues of cultural protocols such as asking elders’ permission to use certain stories and identifying with a location (e.g. one’s ‘country’) become incredibly complicated if an artist chooses to identify with both First Nations groups. Kel did not (and does not) have a problem in identifying because he compartmentalizes the process in the wood carvings in the same way as Leon



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did with his linoprints. Both artists created their own categories of Aboriginalness and Islander-ness and made conscious choices to ‘do’ Aboriginal works or Islander works. Leon focused on fauna which lived in freshwater streams which were found on Kaurareg lands. Kel too focused on fauna which he considered ‘Islander’ such as dugongs, turtles and fish. When he was focusing on his ‘Aboriginal side’, he instead carved kangaroos and platypuses. Fauna content like this becomes ‘culturalized’ in an effort to reconcile the difficulties of having a mixed heritage but does little to nuance or truly express the complexities of the artists’ personal lives. There is no doubt that the market plays a key role in the development of both First Nations identities and First Nations artworks. Funding for art projects – whether at the individual, institutional or organizational levels  – requires monetary investment as well as talented staff and students. As a consequence, sales and public responses to artworks are important in order to continue to engage in the First Nations arts industry. Artists want to make art which requires funding to realize their projects and this can only happen through the type of public approval which results in sales. Many artists have told me about the need to educate the public about their artwork and subsequently their culture in order to get over the hurdle of public expectations. In other words, the expectations of the market can remain unchallenged as well as challenged. All four of these themes – culture, mainstreaming, representation and the market – have helped frame the exploration of the experiences of the students in the TAFE ATSI studio and how they relate to the creation of a First Nations identity. It is also the basis upon which an anthropology of art can be developed. An anthropology of art must have a flexible and malleable theoretical foundation to be useful in working with First Nations material culture traditions. Colonial encounters and cross-cultural engagements are not a universally felt or equally applied process, but they are however a huge part of contemporary material culture production. Howard Morphy writes that what is needed is an anthropology that ‘develops explanatory frameworks that are sensitive to context and which locate events and actions historically’ (2009: 22); that is the approach this study has taken. The artists inside the TAFE studio need to be understood in a framework based on the historical contexts of both the State of Queensland and the local developments in Cairns. Francesca Merlan disagrees with Alfred Gell’s insistence on an anthropology of art that must be ‘universalistic in its scope’ (2001:  201) and this study would not have benefited from such an approach. Merlan instead argues that a theory ‘which would make sense of the notion of “art” in the colonial and post-colonial interface, must be able to specify

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the power of Western art traditions to make themselves relevant to those who “happen” to fall under the sway of colonialism’ (ibid.). This study also takes note with Gell’s rejection of the cultural for the purely social (1998:  2–3). As Robert Layton writes, Gell was ‘correct to reject a specifically linguistic model for visual communication, but that he was wrong to minimise the importance of cultural convention in shaping the reception or “reading” of art objects’ (Layton 2003: 447). Even as a broad-brush concept, culture shaped many of the happenings inside the studio and needed to be a key consideration not only in the reception and reading of art objects but also in the producing of art objects. In addition to Morphy’s critique of previous anthropologies of art, my approach has also been informed by Hans Belting’s anthropology of art. Belting’s theory is about the relationship between image, medium and body. Belting relates these terms to each other and creates a model of understanding of how meaning is created and transmitted through this tripartite structure. Although Belting gives equal weight to image, medium and body, the most significant aspect of Belting’s theory is not so much in how he defines an image but in how he defines the body and its relationship to an image. I have noticed that ‘medium’ becomes the concept which can be an image, the body and/or its own conceptual entity. It is this fluidity of Belting’s use of the term ‘medium’ which really allows for a wide range of applications. First, Belting proposes that the significance of meaning in images is a result of the relationship and dialogue between the individual and the collective. Belting writes that an image is ‘created as the result of personal or collective knowledge and intention’ (2011: 9) and that ‘our internal images are not necessarily personal in nature, but even when they are collective in origin, we internalise them in such a way that we come to consider them as our own’ (2011: 16). Belting defines an image as essentially everything we see, which creates a lot of flexibility in applying his ideas if not a lot of structure. He writes, ‘we are not masters of our images, but rather in a sense at their mercy’ (Belting 2011: 9–10) and in many ways, this resonates with the kind of tensions happening inside the Shed. For Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander artists, there is a relationship between collective and individual identity as a class, as an Indigenous person, as an individual artist and within an individual’s art as a personal experience or a representation of clan/family associations. Images as relationships between the individual and the collective seem appropriate for talking about how Indigenous artists conceive of themselves as ‘Indigenous’ (e.g. ‘Aboriginal’, ‘Islander’), as part of a specific heritage (e.g. ‘Meriam Mir’, ‘Yidinji’, ‘Kaurareg’) and as an individual (e.g. ‘mom’, ‘Christian’, ‘Cairns-based’). This concept is also useful when talking



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about ideologies of culture and tensions which happen within groups and between groups when producing visual material based on ‘culture’. The studio had many examples of what happens between the collective and individual (and between collectives) when the ‘relationships and dialogues’ disagree or expectations don’t match. For example, Lynelle and Pellista strongly identified as born again Christians who found identifying with totems, legends, myths or the Dreamtime very difficult. For them, it was about their relationship with Jesus Christ, it was about being single mothers of seven children (both of them) and about presenting themselves as themselves. They both expressed difficulties being in the studio and feeling ‘pressured’ to produce a certain type of art. The second key element of Belting has the body as the locus of image-making while definitions of the body are analogous to concepts of personal identity. This is especially salient for artists working in the Shed. Belting is using the term ‘body’ as a phenomenological concept, as a medium for image perception, reception and production. Belting writes, ‘the distinction between image and medium is rooted in the self-experience of our body’ (2011: 11). Being in the world through the collection of experiences individuals gather is one way in which the body functions as a focal point for image-making. Belting claims that people ‘relate paintings and photographs as objects, documents and icons to our own image archives’ (2011: 44). The idea of an image archive is not new. Morphy argues for an image archive where the mind is not ‘separated from the agency of the individuals who produce the paintings’ (2009: 15). Morphy further writes that ‘the anthropologist must focus on the production of art in context and have as his or her subject the archive of images that are produced by the minds and imaginations of the interacting individuals, as part of the body of knowledge they have about the world and the means and prescriptions they have for acting in it’ (ibid.). This is the core concept of Belting, along with Morphy’s argument for individual agency, which I find the most attractive to work with in contextualizing aspects of studio life and art production. By defining the body as a receptor and reflector and synthesizer of images, this opens up discussions on why certain motifs are repeated over and over again by specific Indigenous and regional groups. Belting attributes bodies as having ‘personal image archives’ which reflect and synthesize images seen in the public space and individual and private space. This opens up discussions on images which appear ‘Aboriginal’ or ‘Islander’ but which defy such definitions upon the artist producing them. For example, Leon and Allan identify as Aboriginal yet produce imagery which is more in line with Islanders (as demonstrated/defined in the content analysis outlined

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in Chapter 8). The concept of the body as the locus of images explains why two artists who identify as Aboriginal produce art which is made up entirely of an Islander aesthetic. Their ‘personal image archives’ trump any outside label. As Morphy rightly observes, ‘people who use works of art, interact with works of art, respond to works of art, do so with some background of knowledge and experience which may include detailed knowledge of the artwork itself and of innumerable previous interactions involving it, or similar objects’ (Morphy 2009: 14). Ironically, Lynelle is within this group as well because although she classifies herself first and foremost as a ‘Christian’ and resisted and had trouble with Aboriginal art, her ‘style’ – the appearance of her artwork – is only slightly different from the look of other Aboriginal artists in the studio. It wasn’t the manner of art she was protesting, it was the content. The final element describes the nature of an image through its relationship with its medium, and the appeal of certain images because of the seductive quality of the medium. Belting writes, it is ‘not unusual for an image to acquire appeal because it presents itself to us via a seductive carrier medium, perhaps one that presents technological novelty’ (2011: 16). Although Belting often refers to digital media and film in his analysis, his point about the attraction certain media have over others is a valid point and goes a long way in contextualizing the popularity of linoprint in the Cairns region. For example, Torres Strait Islanders have popularized linoprint and it is through linoprint that TSI art has been put on the map (see Alfonso et al. 2001; Brinkman 2010; Callow 2010; Queensland Art Gallery 2011). However, TSI artists did not invent linoprinting nor are they the only Indigenous artists practicing in the medium. They have popularized it though and have become synonymous with the medium especially in the Cairns region. Successful TSI artists emphasize how the marks in lino come from traditional marks originally made on wood (Queensland Art Gallery 2011). Trips to see Haddon’s collection have had a massive effect on those artists able to travel to England; those experiences should not be undervalued as they have allowed artists to bring the traditional into contemporary times as well as legitimizing the artists’ own marks. Published articles about TSI artists and linoprint have emphasized the ‘natural carving abilities’ of TSIers time and time again in order to add another layer of cultural continuity to the art form. One Islander in the Shed was very uncomfortable with lino despite the fact he was an accomplished wood carver and preferred to paint instead of carve. Belting describes the choice of medium through which an image is visible as an ‘appeal’ which is accurate enough but for the artists in the studio, the medium is also chosen for its ability to convey cultural meaning and the status of ‘fine art’.



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This is best seen in Eddie’s preference for a painting of a sardine scoop or weris as appropriate over exhibiting a physical weris inside an art gallery. Sardine scoops have been exhibited in fine arts galleries (see Queensland Art Gallery 2011) but for Eddie, as also potentially influenced via the Cairns market and gallery scene, only one medium for a weris was appropriate. Belting writes, ‘an image finds its true meaning in the fact that what it represents is absent and therefore can be present only as an image. It manifests something that is not in the image but can only appear in the image’ (2011: 85, original emphasis). Here it seems that Belting is being a bit relaxed about his use of an image in our head versus an image presented through a particular medium. Belting clarifies this through stating that an image ‘needs the act of animation by which our imagination draws from its medium’ (2011: 20). That which is absent brings up many instances within the studio in which students produced works which reflect things gone or ‘in the past’ and which, through art production, they were wanting to bring back, remember or pay tribute. Belting’s concept allows for a discussion on how artefacts are linked to previous times and how through visual representation, those past times are brought forward. In this sense, Ian’s shield designs and images which are based on traditional Yidinji shapes from Rainforest shields are also applicable as a way of bringing Yidinji culture forward by representing a form of cultural expression which was interrupted during colonization and now copied and reproduced from photographs and ethnographies. Other examples include the presence of fish scoops, spears, baskets and other artefacts in artworks produced in the Studio as well as the current pottery revival in Yarrabah happening since the 2018 Cairns Indigenous Art Festival. As Morphy writes, ‘people act in relation to objects as a part of a history of relating to objects, a history that is supraindividual yet reproduced through individual action. The knowledge, meanings, interpretations, and experiences that people bring to bear on objects cannot be reduced to individual agency nor can they be produced over a given historical period of time’ (2009: 20). I have returned to Cairns several times since leaving the field in February 2011 to follow up with artists and their attempts at creating a presence in the Cairns First Nations art scene. In 2012, during the Cairns Indigenous Arts Fair (CIAF), the City Council and Arts Queensland paired up to develop several ‘pop-up’ galleries in vacant offices spaces around the downtown area. Several TAFE students – most from my year in the studio and years since – took over a large space for themselves. Covering one entire wall were five large canvases on custom frames created by Tommy Pau. These canvases depict the ceremonial

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clothing worn by Torres Strait men; the process is explained on the small description plaques next to each work. They read in part, ‘Terei Gem Wali is based on the au gem wali (big body clothes) Islanders make. Terei Gem Wali depicts the custom Islanders have of having new clothes made or bought for every special occasion.’ The Terei Gem Wali series is a striking one for several reasons. The sheer size and scale of the canvases are impressive and make a dramatic impact on the viewer with their colour and dense textural patterning. Although hallmarks of Torres Strait iconography are clearly present within these pieces  – such as the dhari, the dibbidibbi, turtles and masks  – the presentation is new to a First Nations Australian aesthetic. This is something new and innovative, presenting a conception of Torres Strait culture in a way which has not been done before. This pop-up gallery exhibition is also noteworthy because it was the first time Lynelle was able to curate an entire display all on her own. The empty retail space1 allocated to the TAFE students was the largest space available  – there were four other pop-up galleries and each was much smaller in comparison. The TAFE gallery was long and wide with unfinished concrete floors and pillars spaced along one wall. It was a challenge to design the space so it was filled with artwork which looked deliberate and not crammed. Lynelle was pleased with the results and so were many who came into the gallery. The four themes discussed throughout this book each speak to the other about the nature of First Nations art and artistic identity. The focus on high culture creates a hierarchy which prioritizes language, artefacts, legends and a flat style which rejects naturalism and realism. The fear of losing the programme reinforces those aspects of First Nations cultural life which were most visible, least controversial and most obviously ‘Indigenous’. Additionally, although many artists when pressed will claim a dual heritage, this focus on high culture complicates people’s ability to be both Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander. Outside the studio, the market rewards those same uncomplicated aspects of First Nations culture. All of these themes are exacerbated by the legacy of QAC and the draconian policies of the Queensland government towards its First Nations population. Some of the students active during the TAFE 2010 period have since made incredible leaps in their careers. In 2016, Tommy Pau won the prestigious 33rd Telstra National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art Award in the category of Works on Paper for his linoprint Battle of Bikar. Depicting the violent history of foreigners in the eastern Torres Strait, it is a result of a lifetime of research and



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a commitment to knowing his island history (Kehren 2016 [online]). Tommy also served on the board at UMI Arts as a director for several years. Lynelle has had several successful exhibitions and has proven herself to be a versatile textile designer, using a variety of techniques, materials and natural dyes. She has run workshops in Aboriginal communities around the Cape York Peninsula such as Wujal Wujal and Hope Vale, encouraging women to do screenprinting on silks and cottons. In 2018, Wujal Wujal was one of the featured communities during the CIAF, with one of their works chosen as the cover image of the festival’s programme. In a fitting turn of events, Lynelle is now the lead vocational instructor at the TAFE Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander arts studio. She actively participates in the fashion shows during CIAF, producing stunning collections while also facilitating the engagement of TAFE student designers. Once again, the studio is being run by a strong First Nations artist. Other accomplishments are more personal in nature. During the 2010 field research period, Peter Morrison was one of the students who carefully separated his artistic styles between what he publically exhibited and what he drew in his journals (see Chapter 6 for more details). During the 2019 CIAF, KickArts Contemporary Arts supported Peter in a massive showcase display of his pen and ink drawings. The support came through a three-month residency (which has been extended) through KickArts’ the Hive. The results included Peter’s Wongai Tree (ink on archival paper). A massive work (half a metre by almost a metre wide), the rendering of the wongai tree is a classic island landscape with all the hallmarks of the kind of realism Peter displayed in his journals while at the TAFE. Instead of being locked away as ‘not Islander enough’, the landscape is on display. Peter told me he had broken through that old way of thinking and it was on proud display.2 There is a Torres Strait Islander saying that if one eats the fruit of the wongai tree, you will always find your way home. Peter has clearly found his way home. In 2012, a few students from the 2010 programme were involved in the diploma exhibition at the Cairns Art Gallery. At the opening night, Tommy was asked to make a speech in which he made some crucial points about the First Nations arts industry while also giving credit to the TAFE arts programme for the space to explore these issues. I have been given permission to reproduce a small part of his speech here. My speech is titled: Where are the Dots? This title came from a visit we as a group had during CIAF at our PopUp Art – Beautiful Art Space Gallery. A visitor came

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in looked around exclaiming, ‘Where are the dot paintings?’ This group of artists [at the Cairns Art Gallery] are practicing in a time of change and challenges. CIAF and online art galleries are putting Far North Queensland art up for the world to see and the world needs to be educated about art styles in the Far North, its peoples and practitioners. The Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Visual Art course and art section at Cairns TAFE has allowed us to explore new and innovative styles and approaches with: quality outcomes, flexible learning, extra curricula involvement in the visual arts [while] catering to our unique way of learning and styles [and] allowing us the opportunity to partake in events which we may not have had.3

This beginning part of the speech points out the relationship artists continue to have with consumers and potential buyers of art. Tommy takes up the issue of the dot and the visitor’s questioning about its absence. The dot in this instance is not just a design element, nor is it an indexical symbol of Indigeneity. The dot has itself become Aboriginal. Tommy continues to explore the dot in the closing comments of his speech. We crossed: pointillism, abstraction, pop art, [dada], surrealism, fantasy, colour fields, crosshatching, design, traditional and contemporary styles to produce what you see in this exhibition. My aim from this little speech is to bring an understanding that Indigenous art here has its own uniqueness, fusion of culture and styles and its own spirit. So where are the dots? The dots are still there but have: evolved, changed their shapes, sizes, colour, design, language, techniques, subjects and stories. The dots are still there in the works and in every indigenous art. For people to see them they must see the spirit, as it is in the spirit of the works that you will find the dots.

Tommy does not deny the existence of the dot  – the dot as something intrinsically Aboriginal or First Nations – but he argues that it has shifted and changed in many different ways. He claims, ‘the dots are still there in the works and in every indigenous art’. This generalization of the genre – he is not speaking about Aboriginal or Islander works but First Nations works – and the continued presence of the dots transform the concept even further. Dots are used here as a symbol for cultural knowledge, practices and expressions. Tommy asserts that the dots are still present even if they are not visible because it is the spirit of the dot – the spirit of First Nations culture in all its forms – that is evident in these artworks. What continues to be fascinating is the power the dot has in First Nations art and how artists seem to have to address the ‘dot issue’ – especially its absence.



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Artists are frustrated by this process of negotiation which seems very one-sided between artists and the industry. Despite what may seem to be a slow process, content in artworks is being challenged in new negotiated spaces created by TAFE students. The struggles inside the classroom reflect the struggles outside the studio, and students graduate with some experience on how to navigate those issues. Students seem to have a higher awareness of the preconceptions of the industry and are determined to change those perceptions – one deadly work at a time.

Notes 1 The pop-up galleries were available due to the Cairns Regional Council’s Beautiful Spaces programme – a programme which facilitates the use of retail and office spaces left unoccupied for temporary shops in order to keep the downtown area viable. For more information see http://www.cairns.qld.gov.au/facilities-andrecreation/arts-culture/beautiful-spaces (accessed 29 January 2013). 2 Personal communication, 12 July 2019. 3 Speech excerpt 23 November 2012. Used with permission.

 

Figure 1 Photo included in the Queensland government’s Public Relations Bureau’s News Bulletin from 28 November 1958. Source: Queensland State Archives Item ID502314, Correspondence, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander.

Figure 2 Early design schematic for the Queensland Native Creations sticker of authenticity which was to be placed on each item for sale, 1959. Source: Queensland State Archives Item ID502314, Correspondence, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander.

Figure 3 QAC artworks sent to Aboriginal Arts Management Association for evaluation in the manner of the Central Desert dot painting style, 1991. Source: Queensland State Archives Item ID646421, Correspondence, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander.

Figure 4 Jack O’Chin, shadowbox from Cherbourg (1962). From the collection of Peg Jackson. Courtesy Michael Aird. Photo credit: The author.

Figure 5 Inside the studio, 2010. Photo credit: The author.

Figure 6 Ian Jensen, Identity (2010), digital work. Photo credit: The artist.

Figure 7 Allan Martin, Cultural Identity: Totems (2010), vinyl-cut print on paper. Photo credit: The author.

Figure 8 Pellista Lammon, Coral Garden (2010), acrylic on canvas. Photo credit: The author.

Figure 9 Lynelle Flinders, Seed Time (2010), acrylic on canvas. Photo credit: The author.

Figure 10 Peter Morrison, monochromatic jug exercise using a biased colour palette, detail (2010). Photo credit: The author.

Figure 11 Example of the Bauhaus experiment in process (2010). Photo credit: The author.

Figure 12 Various boomerangs purchased during the 2010 fieldwork period. Photo credit: The author.

Figure 13 Lynelle Flinders, untitled landscapes (2010), gouache on paper. Photo credit: The author.

Figure 14 Peter Morrison, On the Farm (right) (2010), water colour on paper. Photo credit: The author.

Figure 15 Peter Morrison, Feasting (2010), linoprint. 2010. Photo credit: The author.

Figure 16 Liz Saveka, Everyday People (2010), mixed media on paper. Photo credit: The author.

Figure 17 Liz Saveka, untitled (2010), screenprint and batik. Photo credit: The author.

Figure 18 Charlie Sailor, Rebes (2010). Pen and ink. Photo credit: The author.

Circle/Oval

Crescent

Cross-Hatch

C-Shape

Dash

Dense Pattern

Dot

E-Shape

Fish Tail

Fish Teeth

Free-Form Polygon

Nested Lines

Rhomboid

Rhombus/Netting

Spiral

Square

Star

Tear Drop

Trapezium

Triangle

V-Shape

Wave

Weave

Zig-Zag

Figure 19 Design elements commonly found within the studio. Graphic: The author.

Figure 20 Charlie Sailor, Gabba Gabba (2010), acrylic on canvas. Photo credit: The author.

Figure 21 Allan Martin, Lizard (2010), vinyl-cut print on paper. Photo credit: The author.

Figure 22 Darren Blackman, Moon Cycle (2010), batik. Photo credit: The author.

Figure 23 Peter Morrison, Diving Down (2010), vinyl-cut print on paper. Photo credit: The author.

Figure 24 Charlie Sailor, Torres Strait Pigeon (Dewmer) (2010), acrylic on canvas. Photo credit: The author.

Figure 25 Ian Jensen, ‘Bigunu’ (Shield) > Clan Design (2010), acrylic on canvas. Photo credit: The artist.

Figure 26 Ian Jensen, Creation Series #1 (2010), digital work. Photo credit: The artist.

Figure 27 Tommy Pau, Kab Kar (2010), digital work. Photo credit: The artist.

Figure 28 Tommy Pau, Zogo Le Ra Pone (2010), digital work. Photo credit: The artist.

Figure 29 Tommy Pau, Mask Dancers (2010), vinyl-cut print on paper. Photo credit: The author.

Figure 30 Leon Namai, Kaurareg Nation (2010), vinyl-cut print on paper. Photo credit: The author.

Figure 31 Leon Namai, Seven Brothers (2010), vinyl-cut print on paper. Photo credit: The author.

Figure 32 Eddie Sam, Weris (2010), acrylic on canvas. Photo credit: The author.

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Index Aboriginal Arts Management Association 43, 199 Aird, Michael 37, 47, 48, 199 Arnhem Land 35, 36, 38, 39, 42, 43, 45, 128, 149, 157, 165, 157 art centres 5, 101, 117, 118, 135, 132 art history 14, 16, 43, 46, 68, 69, 149, 150, 172, 173 art markets 1, 8, 11–12, 17–18, 125–6, 134 artefacts, see also individual types 19, 22, 25, 27, 34–5, 44, 48–50, 62, 126, 135, 139, 157, 168, 174, 177, 182–4, 187, 193 Australian Aboriginal Creations 38 authenticity 9–10, 33, 41, 76, 125, 146, 148–9, 158, 198 Banggu Minjaany Art Gallery 84 Bani, Ephraim 70 bark paintings 14–15, 35–9, 42, 45–6, 50, 157–8 batik, medium 63, 65, 68, 72, 75, 83–4, 94, 136–7, 142, 150, 155 Bauhaus School of colour mixing 111, 118, 120–1 Bell, Marshall 45–6, 50, 148 Bell, Richard 45, 47, 49 Belting, Hans 145, 150, 183, 190–3 Black Markets 133 Bleakley, John William 20–6, 30, 34, 40–2 Boigu Island, Queensland 60–87 boomerang(s), artefact 7, 8, 14, 20, 23–5, 27–8, 31–7, 39–43, 48, 50, 89, 126, 134–6, 157 Brisbane Royal Exhibitions 28 Cairns Art Gallery 127, 177, 195–6 Cairns Indigenous Art Fair (CIAF) 94, 118, 193, 195–6 canoe, artefact 26, 177, 178

Cape York, Queensland 7, 12, 13, 16, 57, 62, 69, 117, 131, 135, 160, 163, 180, 195 Central Australia 7, 43 Centrelink 88, 91 Cherbourg, Queensland 22, 24, 26, 30–5, 37, 40–1, 48, 50 Chief Protector 20–1, 24, 26, 34 club, artefact 141, 159 Coates, Ken 29 collections 13, 23, 26–7, 43, 148, 154, 167, 173–5, 179, 191, 192, 195 Conroy, John 42–50, 57 content analysis 104, 130, 149–50, 159, 163, 164, 167–8, 181, 183, 184, 191 Cooktown, Queensland 7, 13, 24 copyright 15, 35, 39, 42, 44, 46, 48, 50, 70, 74, 105, 120, 122 cross-cultural engagements 189 cultural content 58, 62, 69–71, 74, 76–7, 103–4, 122–4, 126, 138, 141–3, 152, 164, 167–84 cultural knowledge 87, 125, 174–5, 196 culture concept 3–4, 17, 187–8 culture First Nations 2, 14, 23, 29, 32, 38, 48, 95, 99, 105, 194, 196 high culture 2, 103, 110, 123, 124, 187–8, 194 loss of 2 representation of 150, 157, 194 see cultural content; teaching of 17, 70, 123 curios 19–50 curriculum 17, 50, 58, 63, 70–6, 95, 103–6, 108, 100, 111, 121–3, 127, 137–42, 145, 163, 188 dance/dancing 11, 12, 14, 17, 57, 72, 81–2, 84, 88, 93, 96, 103–9, 133, 135, 139, 147, 176–9, 182–3, 187, 188

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Index

Darnley Island, see Erub Island deadly 1, 88, 127–30, 132, 137, 143, 146, 197 dense pattern, as a design element 139, 141, 151, 152, 153, 181, 183 design elements 2, 17, 41, 139, 145–65, 179, 181, 183, 184 dhari, also headdress, artefact 139, 176–8, 194 dibbidibbi, also shell breastplate 194 didgeridoo 7–8, 157 dot paintings 7–8, 43, 153, 196 dot as an art style 7–8, 43–6, 70, 118, 125, 126, 135, 196 as a design element 145, 148, 149–52, 153–7 Dreamtime, the 9, 107, 112, 121, 122, 171, 191 Eglitis, Anna 63–4, 66, 67, 68, 75, 76, 83 Erub Island, also Darnley Island 11, 26, 87, 90, 93, 99, 108, 109, 115, 141, 159, 176 e-Shape, as a design element 151, 152, 153, 171, 178–81, 183 feathers, medium 182 figurative/human figures 68, 146, 150, 159, 178, 187 fish scoop, see weris Fletcher, Gloria, see Thancoupie Flinders, Lynelle 7, 87, 89, 92, 96, 97, 98, 109–10, 121, 138–9, 153, 183, 191, 192, 194, 195 Fourmile, Henrietta 70 Fourmile, Seith 70 gammon 1, 93 geometric designs 169, 181 gorr, also rattle, artefact 139 gouache, medium 138–9 Haddon, A. C. 13, 173–5, 178, 179, 182, 192 headdress, artefact, see Dhari Hope Vale, Queensland 12, 35, 40, 46, 49 Hudson, David 71

human figures/figurative 68, 146, 150, 159, 178, 187 Hurley, Ron 49, 50, 70 identifying Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander, self 85–7 in art 168–72, 181, 188 collective/group 147 coursework of 9, 168–72 personal 110, 174, 191 images, theorizing of 2, 12, 41, 44, 65, 70, 99, 112, 130, 131, 136, 145–6, 149–50, 168, 174–7, 183–4, 190–3 Inuit First Nation Canadians 19, 29, 32, 34–5, 192 Jenuarrie 70 journals, personal 98, 127, 138–43, 187, 195 Kab Kar 175–6 Kaurareg, cultural group 142, 167, 179–82, 189, 190 KickArts Contemporary Arts 127, 195 Lammon, Pellista 87, 91, 93, 97, 98, 108–9, 110, 156, 183, 191 Lampton, Elaine 65–6, 69, 75, 83, 101, 104, 111, 115, 117, 119, 122–3, 129, 188 landscapes, art style 138–9, 146, 183, 187, 195 Laura, Queensland 69–70, 157 linoprinting, medium 75, 83, 94, 107, 108, 129, 132, 137, 139, 150, 155, 189, 192, 194 Lockhart River 47, 98, 118 mainstreaming 81, 85, 93, 95, 187–9 Marika, Wandjuk 45 mask, artefact 99, 138, 177–9, 181–3, 194 Morrison, Peter 89, 93, 116, 139, 158, 161, 163, 176, 183, 195 Namai, Leon 99, 136–7, 142, 159, 167, 179–84, 188, 189, 191 non-representational, art style 112, 154, 167, 168

Index

229

pan-Aboriginal motifs 147–9, 151, 152, 156, 184 Pau, Robert Tommy 10–11, 85, 86, 89–90, 93, 94, 95, 97, 99, 125, 136, 137, 157, 159, 173, 174, 175–9, 182, 183, 184 pearl shell, medium 26, 30, 33 pedagogy, see curriculum Port Douglas markets 133–5, 143 pottery, medium 28, 35, 41, 42, 49, 50, 62, 130, 193 Pueblo First Nation Americans 19, 28, 32, 34–5, 52

scrubhen, also scrubfowl 107, 162–3, 171 seed beads/nuts, medium 133 Serico, Roslyn 37–38, 43, 45–6, 48 shell breastplate, see Dibbidibbi shield, artefact 13, 14, 23, 24, 33, 84, 107, 168–72, 193 symbolism 107, 154, 169, 171, 176

Queensland Art Gallery 13, 16, 49, 58, 173, 192, 193 Queensland Native Creations 30–4 Queensland Tourist Board 24 Queensland Tourist Bureau’s Window Display, 1933 21–3

UMI Arts 11–12, 133, 134, 161, 195

rattle, see Gorr realism, art style 138–9, 168, 194, 195, 195 Rebes 141 representational, art style 112, 139, 151, 154, 163, 167–8 Robinson, Brian 58, 69, 173, 178, 179 rock art 14, 69–70, 75, 157 Royal Jubilee National Exhibition, Brisbane, 1935 25–8 Sailor, Charlie 90, 92, 93, 96, 140–1, 159, 176 Sam, Eddie 93, 159, 163, 177–8, 193 Saunders, Zane 67, 69, 74 Saveka, Liz 86, 87, 89, 93, 97, 98, 100, 140, 159 screen-printing, medium 63, 64, 68, 72, 83, 84, 195

Thancoupie (Gloria Fletcher) 62 totems 72, 75, 103, 106–11, 123, 124, 159–63, 170, 180, 182, 191 tourism 16, 25

Wandjina 44 watercolour, medium 138, 140 weris, artefact, also fish scoop 159, 177–8, 193 Wilcox School of Colour Mixing 113, 118 Williams, Kel 86, 89, 97, 133–5, 188, 189 wood/woodworking 61, 89, 90, 104, 133, 134, 135, 177, 180, 188, 192 Woorabinda, Queensland 24, 26, 41 workshops 11, 12, 90, 195 X-Ray 8, 39, 42, 131, 134, 135 Yarrabah, Queensland 4, 8, 12, 23, 24, 26, 41, 49, 50, 61, 193 Yidinji, cultural group 87, 107–8, 135, 146, 154, 163, 167, 168–72, 178, 184, 190, 193 zig-zag, as a design element 14, 183 Zogo Le ra Pone (Eyes of the Magic Man) 176–7

230