SOLD
This piece won The Clarence Valley Indigenous Art Award (CVIAA) 2015 and is now part of the Grafton Regional Gallery Permanent Collection.
This piece is a charm necklace, an offering, made of small feet (replicas I’ve cast of a souvenir style ceramic foot made in the 1960’s by Studio Anna and sold from regional holiday destinations).
The 40 disembodied feet, which reference the macabre practice of collecting body parts and phrenology, are etched with the names of our reserves, missions and stations in NSW that are ‘remote’ communities, fringe dwelling settlements, that sit outside a lot of country towns in NSW.
These places are euphemistically named ‘communities’ and are what exist now in place of the missions and reserves that remnants of the Aboriginal tribes were herded onto in the 20th century.
The feet hang from rusty chains which symbolize the fact that many Aboriginal people living regionally and remotely in NSW are still, metaphorically, in chains because of strangulating and complex Native Title legislation which is such a difficult and lengthy process for people. Meanwhile mining companies are buying up land everywhere and taking over and destroying our remaining environments.
Because of Local Land Council legislation communities are not allowed to borrow to build amenities and infrastructure and are also out of the jurisdiction of the local municipal councils, they are neglected and dysfunctional.
It’s an intractable situation but Aboriginal people have history in these places over many years and they are very important culturally. They need support.
NB: This is by no means an exhaustive list of communities in NSW.