Significant travelling exhibition honours the Gurindji Wave Hill Walk-Off and its continuing impacts

Touring organisation Artback NT, and the Department of Tourism, Sport and Culture’s Araluen Arts Centre, are proud to present Still in my mind: Gurindji location, experience and visuality, curated by Brenda L. Croft.

“We are very proud to host this important exhibition at the Araluen Arts Centre, particularly with the significant resonance given the driving force behind the exhibition’s creation and content,” Senior Director of the Department of Tourism, Sport and Culture’s Araluen Cultural Precinct, Dr Mark Crees said.

“Brenda L. Croft is a renowned artist and curator having been involved in the contemporary arts and cultural sector for three decades. She is a member of the Gurindji/Malngin/ Mudburra peoples and was one of ten Sydney-based contemporary Indigenous artists who founded the Boomalli Aboriginal Artists Co-operative in 1987.”

Inspired by the words of revered Gurindji/ Malngin leader Vincent Lingiari, ‘that land... I still got it on my mind,’ the exhibition Still in my mind reflects on events preceding and following the seminal Gurindji Walk Off – where Lingiari led over 200 countrymen, women and children off Wave Hill Station to protest poor wages and conditions.

Brenda L. Croft, who both curated and features as a participating artist, developed the exhibition through long-standing practice-led research with her father’s community, Karungkarni Art and Culture Aboriginal Corporation and UNSW Galleries, UNSW Art & Design.

“The 1966 Walk-Off was a trigger point in the national land rights movement in Australia, so the events of this time and place are significant to me as a Gurindji/Malngin/Mudburra woman, through my direct family connection to the area, and through my family’s experience as members of the Stolen Generations” Croft said.

Still in my mind: Gurindji location, experience and visuality features a diversity of art mediums, including photo-media, video installation, paintings, found objects and archival material, to explore diverse notions of home, community and country.

In developing the exhibition, Croft retraced the steps of those who made the 22 kilometre Wave Hill Walk-Off journey half a century ago, in homage to those before her.

“I was motivated to develop this exhibition in partnership with Karungkarni artists and Gurindji community members in tribute to those whose profound communal act of courage, resilience and determination changed the course of history,” Ms Croft explained.

Louise Partos, Executive Officer of Artback NT said, “We are both excited and proud to tour this stunning exhibition which engages with such an important event in Australia’s history, one that continues to resonate powerfully today. The wealth of archival materials and diverse artistic responses presented by this exhibition highlight the legacy of the Walk Off and its significance for Aboriginal diaspora around the country,”

“This is a beautiful exhibition of profound depth and we are honoured to be sharing this with audiences across Australia”.

The exhibition is touring venues throughout the NT in 2018 - 2019 before travelling around the country in 2019 – 2021.

Still in my mind: Gurindji location, experience and visuality will be officially opened on Friday 14 June at 6pm.

Join curator and participating artist Brenda L. Croft for a floor talk at Araluen Arts Centre on Saturday 15 June, from 10:30am, as she offers important insights into the curation and significance of this exhibition.

Still in my mind: Gurindji location, experience and visuality will show in the Araluen Galleries until 11 August.

Image: Brenda L Croft, Self-portrait on country, Wave Hill, 2014, 2014, pigment print on archival paper. Courtesy the artist, Stills Gallery, Sydney and Niagara Galleries, Melbourne.