Reclaiming the river: Perth waterfront schemes
During his tenure as prime minister from 1996 to 2007, John Howard was intent on stimulating discussion to define Australian identity. This culminated in what commentators referred to as the “culture wars” – public debates over interpretations of the British colonization of Australia. Projects for Perth’s waterfront, conceived in the lead-up to this period constitute both responses to Australia’s contested history and identity, as well as “symbolic pointers to what was taking place in the psyche” of European Australian society.1 By virtue of the way they symbolize nature, the projects question how European Australian culture relates to Australia’s landscape and Indigenous culture.
Perth waterfront schemes in the 1990s
In the 1990s, Perth’s foreshore – a vacuous greenbelt “reclaimed” from the river in the twentieth century
