REPRESENTATION, REMEMBRANCE AND THE MEMORIAL
We acknowledge the Boon Wurrung and Woiwurrung (Wurundjeri) peoples of the Kulin Nation as traditional owners of the land on which we work and live, and pay our respect to their ancestors and Elders.
The design charrettes: Introduction by Brook Andrew
Ngajuu ngaay nginduugirr, orana.
I am a Wiradjuri Celtic man from Australia. Wiradjuri Nation is in the state of New South Wales and, along with other southeast nations, bore the brunt of British colonial invasion, which was and still is met with fierce resistance from many of our people, past and present.
In 2010, I made the artwork Jumping Castle War Memorial for the Biennale of Sydney. I had been thinking about the lack of memorials and spaces in Australia to remember the events of the Frontier Wars, reflecting not only on the Australian experience but also internationally, on all those who are still fighting for visibility in a colonial-dominated public space.1 It is an inflatable jumping castle, adorned in a black-and-white pattern of Wiradjuri design. In the corner towers hang skulls, a reference to the trade in Aboriginal human remains that closely followed the events of the Frontier Wars. Jumping Castle War Memorial met with a range of responses from viewers. One visitor kicked off her shoes, eager to jump, while another told her, “This work is about genocide, how can you jump on that?”
The instigated the current research project I have been leading since the beginning of 2016 (1988), curated by Djon Mundine and made by forty-three Ramingining artists from Arnhem Land, is now permanently housed in the National Gallery of Australia, and significant artworks have been made by many First Nations artists, including r e a, Judy Watson, Fiona Foley, Julie Gough, Maree Clarke, Mumu Mike Williams and Mr Timms. A growing number of community-led massacre memorials are also being established across the country. Architecturally, much more needs to be done, and recognized, to address the brutal truths of Australia’s past and account for the 60,000-plus-year history of Aboriginal culture and occupation. More recently, Yagan Square was completed in Perth, which brings significant visibility to the Noongar warrior and, as Stephen Gilchrist has noted, to Noongar “ways of being.”
