The Indigenous voice of Australia is over 65 000 years old. During NAIDOC Week 2019, with the theme of ‘voice, treaty and truth’, we invited award-winning author and Mununjali woman Ellen Van Neerven to develop a series of written responses entitled ‘Collecting Australia‘, which draw inspiration from works featured in our Australian Art Collection.
This is one of a three blogs by van Neerven, and features Judy Watson, combining her artwork with van Neerven’s poetry. You can also read poems inspired by Dale Harding and Destiny Deacon.
Judy Watson
The poem, ‘sacred ground beating heart’ takes its title from Judy Watson’s painting. I have always loved this work so I appreciated the chance to write to it. Plus the title just lends itself well to poetry!
I wrote this series of poems, ‘Collecting Australia’ in two places: in the Gallery sitting before the works, and abroad in Germany, where I had a travel engagement. I missed my Country a lot while I was away. I think this work really captures what that connection is like, how deeply it is felt through your whole body.
sacred ground beating heart 1989 is pinned to the gallery wall, and remains unstretched as exhibited, rebuffing the classical traditions of European paintings.
Judy Watson ‘sacred ground beating heart’ 1989
sacred ground beating heart
sacred ground beating heart ancient sound feeding art we’re all sleeping on a sensation bigger than us, bigger than the body if you roll me I’ll be thunder if you squeeze me I’ll be dance move, jahjam, move put your feet in the earth recover yourself don’t stop dreaming softly spin all the way around sacred ground beating heart ancient sound feeding art
Ellen van Neerven (Meanjin, July 2019)
Judy Watson
Through paint and pigment Judy Watson, a descendant of the Waanyi people of north-west Queensland, offers evidence of intimate encounters with the heat, air and moisture and pulse of the earth — the geographical emblems of her heartland. These emblems are linked with Australian Aboriginal totemic beings or culture heroes who metamorphosed into landscape features such as hills and rocks, and who continue to manifest their presence as meteorological or astral phenomena. The unstretched canvas has been stained by layers of wet and dry pigment, creating a velvety, sensuous surface which is then marked by distinct touches of colour. The imagery suggests an aerial perspective of parched land, a depiction of distant homelands or a material translation of an emotional state.
This project is part of ‘Drawing from the Collection’, a series of programs which invite you to take inspiration and draw ideas from the QAGOMA Collection through ongoing experiences from special events, to daily drop-in drawing.
Acknowledgment of Country
The Queensland Art Gallery | Gallery of Modern Art (QAGOMA) acknowledges the Traditional Owners of the land on which the Gallery stands in Brisbane. We pay respect to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Elders past and present and, in the spirit of reconciliation, acknowledge the immense creative contribution First Australians make to the art and culture of this country. It is customary in many Indigenous communities not to mention the name or reproduce photographs of the deceased. All such mentions and photographs are with permission, however, care and discretion should be exercised.
As a poet, Ellen Van Neerven loves the challenge of responding to artworks, meeting them with her own craft. This poem inspired by Destiny Deacon’s Portrait – Eva Johnson, writer is from a series titled ‘Collecting Australia’, and includes poems created for the works of Dale Harding and Judy Watson.
This is the second in a three blog series, combining Van Neerven’s poetry with works within the QAGOMA Collection.
In celebration of NAIDOC Week, we invited award-winning author and Mununjali woman Ellen Van Neerven to develop a series of written responses which draw inspiration from works featured in our Australian Collection.
Collecting Australia
I deliberately chose artworks from Queensland artists to respond to, because this is where I’m from. I wrote ‘Portrait of Destiny’ because Destiny Deacon is always highlighting our people through portraiture and I wanted to flip this around and highlight her and how strong she is, contributing to this very Indigenous way of honouring each other and those who have come before us.
Deacon’s Portrait – Eva Johnson, writer is about the poet, actor, director and playwright who was born in Daly River, Northern Territory of Australia. Eva Johnson began writing in 1979; her first play was titled When I Die You’ll All Stop Laughing. Her writing spoke about Aboriginal Australian women’s rights, the stolen generation, land rights, slavery, sexism and homophobia.
This series reflects on what it means to ‘collect’ Australia, and how the tension between the Eu-Grip and Dhagan (Aboriginal land) manifests. I hope my words on this art in turn inspire future art and/ or creations/ imaginings.
Thanks, Sis, for dropping the ‘c’ for us urban blaks
You gave us way to break free of the whitefellas expectations
define our identity on our own terms
Thanks for taking the white people’s invention
putting your blak eye behind the lens publishing protecting
the humanity of us women us men us children
You know I also feel when I’m sitting on the couch
I am always feeling too much
storytelling sometimes is the only way out
you gave those dolls a home!
Brunswick Sista wherever you go living room Island
darkroom gallery classroom kitchen lecture hall
you fly tid you fly
Ellen van Neerven (Meanjin, July 2019)
Destiny Deacon
The politics of representation and their implications for Indigenous people are at the core of Destiny Deacon’s artistic practice, which is largely photography, but also film and installation. Her works combine wit and anger to subvert ethnographic misconceptions about Aboriginal people. Deacon’s low-tech, snap- shot type images humorously redress stereotypical Anglo-European portrayals of Indigenous peoples and seek to confront viewers with unacknowledged prejudices and anxieties. In doing so, she takes control of how Aboriginal peoples are represented.
The image Portrait – Eva Johnson, writer 1994 is appropriated from J M Crossland’s painting Namultera, a young cricketer of the Native’s Training Institution, Poonindie 1854, in the collection of the National Library of Australia. Deacon had seen the work on loan at the National Gallery of Australia and later improvised with her friends Eva Johnson to pose, with the assistance of Virginia Fraser, artist, writer, editor and curator, to stage the image. In Deacon’s version however, the subject’s cricket bat has been replaced by an axe.
The subject, Eva Johnson (b.1946) is an Aboriginal Australian poet, actor, director and playwright, and was named Aboriginal Artist of the Year in 1985, and in 1993 received the inaugural Red Ochre Award from the Australia Council for the Arts for lifetime achievement.
This project is part of ‘Drawing from the Collection’, a series of programs which invite you to take inspiration and draw ideas from the QAGOMA Collection through ongoing experiences from special events, to daily drop-in drawing.
Acknowledgment of Country
The Queensland Art Gallery | Gallery of Modern Art (QAGOMA) acknowledges the traditional custodians of the land upon which the Gallery stands in Brisbane. We pay respect to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander elders past and present and, in the spirit of reconciliation, acknowledge the immense creative contribution Indigenous people make to the art and culture of this country. It is customary in many Indigenous communities not to mention the name or reproduce photographs of the deceased. All such mentions and photographs are with permission, however, care and discretion should be exercised.
In celebration of NAIDOC Week 2019, we invited award-winning author and Mununjali woman Ellen Van Neerven to develop a series of written responses entitled ‘Collecting Australia’, which draw inspiration from works featured in our Australian Art Collection.
This is the first of three blogs combining our work with van Neerven’s poetry.
Collecting Australia
I wrote this series of poems, ‘Collecting Australia’ in two places: in the Gallery sitting before the works, and abroad in Germany, where I had a travel engagement.
I understand the newly developed Australian Collection as a reimagination. What is Australia anyway?
As a poet, I love the challenge of responding to artworks, meeting them with my own craft. I was deliciously drawn to Dale Harding’s Wall Composition in Reckitt’s Blue 2017 which covers a whole wall. I sat by this work for… I guess it was over an hour. The first poem I wrote was ‘Footnotes on a timeline’, and it captures all of my immediate feelings about the work. The shovel handle stencil motif in this artwork inspired ‘Call a spade a spade’. I saw an interview with Dale where he talked about the woman figure on the right in this artwork as representing women’s work and our matriarchal cultures so I wrote ‘The woman looking down’ about my own mother and grandmother and great-grandmother.
Dale Harding introduces Wall composition in Reckitt’s Blue / Subscribe to QAGOMA YouTube to be the first to go behind-the-scenes
Harding considers a fuller history of art production in Australia – from Indigenous (pre-European) to colonial to contemporary times. The tension in the Euro-centric perspective on Australia followed me in Germany, where I had a revelation of sorts. It is important to frame colonisation in two ways: events in Europe, events in Australia, there’s a direct relationship. I participated in a postcolonial walking tour in Bremen, in the north of Germany, where I saw what invading other countries had brought to Germany society. The city, the harbor and the waterways was created and shaped by this. Not ‘post’ anything, colonisation is still alive and well, it just goes by other names. By using a made-up spelling ‘Urup’ in my poem ‘Postcolonial musings in Urup’ I wanted to apply an Aboriginal sensibility to the word, and in doing so frame Europe as the other. Put the sharp microscope back on countries like Germany, The Netherlands, England and France, uncover the trails of exploitation, and see how they are still designed by default to exploit other countries.
While I hiked the Schwarzwald (Black Forest) in the south of Germany, I was struck by a feeling of sadness, haunting. I wrote about this in ‘a ship-shaped hole in the forest’, and I became interested to retrace the Cook’s Endeavour back to its source. Facing history from this angle, I felt oddly calm.
As well as having Mununjali Yugambeh (South East Queensland) heritage, I have Dutch heritage, and when I visited my family in the Netherlands I thought about my mixed-race body, two very different perspectives in my genes. ‘Funeral Plan’ is about this.
The following works reflect on what it means to ‘collect’ Australia, and how the tension between the Eu-Grip and Dhagan (Aboriginal land) manifests. I hope my words on this art in turn inspire future art and/ or creations/ imaginings.
Watch as Dale Harding creates Wall Composition in Reckitt’s Blue / Subscribe to QAGOMA YouTube to be the first to go behind-the-scenes
Footnotes on a timeline
Burnt in blue to circumnavigate the strange land of evanescence, the blue line they call time moving all forward, bluing the blackfellas they dared called savage – you can’t steal from savages. There was infinite wealth to steal. Do you understand what it means to be a beneficiary of colonisation? Can we creep through the timeline and draw against the ancient-modern binary?
I can point on one side of the wave my ancestors’ story, I trace it through, they thought they cleaned it up but they built the shallowest grave. Their sold their soul for gold and coal and oil and we line our stomachs with water, it will be our armour, we are the people that can live inside our dreaming, live inside the sea, like inside a turtle’s heartbeat, live inside the sun on the sand, warm this country for centuries because we are the real entities. Don’t turn a blind eye please, all we need for you to see is that climate is our only bank. If we don’t have healthy water, air, earth, we got nothing. So where does your money go, where does your time go, my time and your time are on this timeline.
There’s time for us to read out all of the footnotes, go over the fine print. They burnt records of us in fires, the stole the evidence of our survival. But check my blood, I’m from here. This country is a haunted house, governments still playing cat chasing marsupial mouse. How many lies on your timeline? Have you ever felt like you’re just killing time? We’re still smoking sores. Let’s carbon date it, baby. We have time to read out all the footnotes of a timeline in Reckitt’s Blue.
Call a Spade a Spade
A heart a heart
A diamond a diamond
A club a club
Call it invasion not settlement
Call it genocide not colonisation
Call it theft not establishment
Don’t call January 26 Australia Day
Don’t shy away from telling the truth
Don’t say ‘no worries’ say ‘I worry’
for the future of our country, our environment
if we fail to listen and to act
Don’t say ‘we’re full’
Say we’re open
Call yourself an ally
Call yourself a mate
The woman looking down
is my mother
she’s stressing the way
come here my jahjam
the ancestors whisper
come now, sit on my shoulder
you’re safe
you listen
you think of us
“Postcolonial” musings in Urup
Urup colonised itself
and now has a belly ache
like the snake that ate
a kangaroo
local languages
hang in the balance
the river pushed
for commerce
coffee grounds on the
railway tracks
cotton seeds
in the air
merchant houses
built on backs
wolves asked
welcomed back
beavers needed
to clean the river
the red squirrel
fends of the grey
migrant children play football
on the hills
gold draped buildings
fester in the city
here their traditions honoured
so why isn’t ours?
let’s get the U-Grip
of our Dhagun
A ship-shaped hole in the forest
Such a sad sight: a ship-shaped hole in the forest
still recovering from the fright of colonisation
The straightest pine cut into masts
elm into keel and stern post
white oak into hull, floors and futtocks
For the farms: streams of straw and cattle
graze on the deforested floor.
While the ship sails in the southern seas
the ship-shaped hole
thousands of years deep
aches and aches
the people burn their furniture to stay warm
try to regenerate with new trees
left with commercial forests
and waldsterben.
no consent was asked from the materials of “discovery”
in Yugambeh our names for boat and
tree that makes the boat are the same
material handled with care
spirit lives
in the same name
so do I call you tree or mast
as I walk through the wood
full of so many ship-shaped holes?
Funeral Plan
what can you do with your body?
it’s just one body
my Aunt and Uncle are burying themselves in a curated forest
it costs $4000
when history becomes necessary
the sadness belongs to me
I am not aware of my power
you watch me build my weapon
Ellen van Neerven (Meanjin, July 2019)
Dale Harding
Working in diverse techniques and traditions, including painting, installation, sculpture, domestic handicrafts, stenciling, woodcarving and silicone casting, Dale Harding is renowned for works that explore the untold histories of his communities. Harding has a particular interest in ideas of cultural continuum and investigates the social and political realities experienced by his family under government control in Queensland, with a focus on matrilineal antecedents.
This project is part of ‘Drawing from the Collection’, a series of programs which invite you to take inspiration and draw ideas from the QAGOMA Collection through ongoing experiences from special events, to daily drop-in drawing.
NAIDOC stands for National Aborigines and Islanders Day Observance Committee. Its origins can be traced to the emergence of Aboriginal groups in the 1920′s which sought to increase awareness in the wider community of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Australians. NAIDOC week is celebrated yearly from the first Sunday in July.
Acknowledgment of Country
The Queensland Art Gallery | Gallery of Modern Art (QAGOMA) acknowledges the traditional custodians of the land upon which the Gallery stands in Brisbane. We pay respect to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander elders past and present and, in the spirit of reconciliation, acknowledge the immense creative contribution Indigenous people make to the art and culture of this country. It is customary in many Indigenous communities not to mention the name or reproduce photographs of the deceased. All such mentions and photographs are with permission, however, care and discretion should be exercised.
Feature image: Dale Harding Wall Composition in Reckitt’s Blue 2017
#DaleHarding #EllenvanNeerven #QAGOMA
Still life artist and art educator, John Honeywill begins our exploration of the studio as an essential site for housing the ideas, images and objects of his creative process. A place where he can work through, leave and return to his thoughts.
At its core, Open Studio at the Queensland Art Gallery (QAG) is a home for the creative process. Whether you are looking at artworks selected by each guest artist, sitting down to engage in a drawing tutorial at our drawing stations, watching artist interviews, reading artist books or exploring materials and works in progress on loan from the artist’s studio, you are connecting with the skills and ideas that inform a living creative process.
This is the first in a series of blogs that explores the artists space. Pick up clues and tips about how the artist experiments, manipulates and refines materials and processes. Open Studio is open daily and includes a range of onsite programs for creative activities and broader learning.
Meet John Honeywill
John Honeywill began painting in 1974 and he currently concentrates on still life, a subject that has interested Honeywill since childhood.
Honeywill engages with the genre of still life as a tradition that holds genuine relevance to contemporary life. He invites visitors to create their own still life works through two drawing stations and through a range of workshops programmed in the Studio.
Watch | John Honeywill
The first Open Studio
As QAGOMA has been interwoven into John Honeywill life since he was a teenager, Open Studio is a great opportunity to talk to visitors about the process and act of making art , and give back to an institution that has given so much.
John Honeywill’s selection of artworks on display as part of his Open Studio project includes work from artists such as Vida Lahey who have taught students and mentored other artists, along with many who are currently working as educators such as Marian Drew.
Watch | John Honeywill
The importance of the studio
A studio is a space where you work, and at the end of the day you can leave your thoughts, ideas, and when you return the next morning, they are still there. It enables the continuity of your work.
In the centre of Open Studio at QAG sits a small Artist Space filled with objects, materials, and visual stimulus from the artist’s actual studio. John Honeywill has invested time and consideration into his selection and positioning of elements from his studio to help visitors understand his way of working.
Look closely at the images and drawings on the clip board. Consider how they relate to the unfinished work on the easel and how this relationship demonstrates how an artist is able to return to the studio to pick up where they left off.
Watch | John Honeywill
Reading List For Open Studio, John Honeywill selected these books on the artists who inspired him. To read, research or learn more about these artists, visit the QAGOMA Research Library.
Laura Mattioli and others. Giorgio Morandi: Late Paintings. David Zwirner, New York, 2017. Paul Hills. Brice Marden. Rizzoli International Publications, New York, 2018. Donald Woodman. Agnes Martin and Me. Lyon Artbooks, New York, 2016. Chris Bedson. Euan Uglow: Sargy Mann. John Rule, 2017. Michael Hawker and others. Margaret Olley – A Generous Life. QAGOMA, Brisbane, 2019
QAGOMA Research Library
The QAGOMA Research Library is located on Level 3 of the Gallery of Modern Art (GOMA). Open to the public Tuesday to Friday 10.00am to 5.00pm. visit us in person or explore the online catalogue. Access to special collections is available by appointment.
Featured image detail: John Honeywill painting at Open Studio
Ben Quilty reflects on his friendship with Margaret Olley, and the lasting influence of her support on his practice. Olley was a generous donor, mentor to emerging artists and a firm friend to many.
Ben Quilty in conversation
Olley (1923–2011) was the subject of Quilty’s 2011 Archibald winning portrait. His portrait is of an unflinching close-up of a truthfully aged face, yet her bright eyes command the viewer’s gaze. Olley is the only subject to win the prestigious Archibald prize twice, self portraits by Brett Whiteley and William Robinson aside. An Archibald at the beginning of her career, and an Archibald at the end – the 63-year span between William Dobell’s (1948) and Quilty’s award winning portraits is a true reflection of Olley’s enduring influence on other artists.
Olley first met and awarded Quilty the Brett Whiteley Travelling Art Scholarship in 2002 when he was only 29 – she loved his thick use of paint.
Ben Quilty reflects on his work, art practice and career at the opening of his exhibition ‘Quilty’ at the Gallery of Modern Art (GOMA). Quilty is in conversation with friend and exhibition curator Lisa Slade, Assistant Director, Artistic Programs, Art Gallery of South Australia.
Quilty gives us an insight into his day, his working practice at his studio in the Northern Highlands of New South Wales, his place of solitude, and his current and future projects. He also fondly remembers Margaret Olley (1923–2011), the subject of his 2011 Archibald winning portrait, and her lasting influence.
Tribute to Margaret Olley
Quilty has created a series of site-specific, hand-drawn portraits of Margaret Olley. These large-scale chalk drawings are based on preparatory sketches he made for the Archibald portrait. Quilty has cast in chalk some of the objects Olley gave him over the years; teapots, jugs, and vases, and used these to produce the wall drawings.
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Feature image: Ben Quilty’s studio in the Northern Highlands of New South Wales.
‘Quilty’ at the Gallery of Modern Art (GOMA) 29 June – 13 October 2019 was the first major survey exhibition in a decade of one of Australia’s most acclaimed contemporary artists, Ben Quilty.
#QuiltyGOMA #BenQuilty #QAGOMA
We acknowledge the Traditional Owners of the land on which the Queensland Art Gallery | Gallery of Modern Art stands and recognise the creative contribution First Australians make to the art and culture of this country.