2020 Shireen Malamoo: Work is a Healer Publication

WORK IS A HEALER

SHIREEN MALAMOO

Published on the occasion of the exhibition

Work is a Healer: Shireen Malamoo

Perc Tucker Regional Gallery, Townsville

25 September – 22 November 2020

ISBN | 978-0-949461-41-4

Publisher

Perc Tucker Regional Gallery

Townsville City Council

PO Box 1268

Townsville City, Queensland, 4810 galleries@townsville.qld.gov.au

©Galleries, Townsville City Council, and respective artists and authors, 2020

All images ©the artist/s and photographer/s

Artwork

Shireen Malamoo

Artwork Documentation Through the Looking Glass Studios

Publication and Design Development

Rob Donaldson

Cover image:

Shireen Malamoo, Stoic women on Plantation Creek, Town Camp, Ayr, North Queensland | Beautiful view of water lilies nd Oil and acrylic on canvas, dims 84.8 x 99.7 cm

Inside front cover:

Assembly of God Church Congregation, Plantation Creek, Ayr, c.1930

Inside back cover: Plantation workers

Perc Tucker Regional Gallery

Cnr Denham and Flinders St

Townsville QLD 4810

Tue - Fri 10am – 3pm Sun 10am – 1pm

(07) 4727 9011

galleries@townsville.qld.gov.au

whatson.townsville.qld.gov.au

Townsville City Galleries

TownsvilleCityGalleries

The Townsville City Council acknowledges the Gurambilbarra Wulgurukaba, Bindal, Nywaigi and Gugu Badhun peoples as the Traditional Owners and custodians of Council’s Local Government Area and we recognise their connection to land, sea and community. We pay our respects to them, their cultures and to their Elders, past, present and emerging.

Warning: Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples should be aware that this publication contains images and names of people who have passed away.

FOREWORD

Shireen Malamoo’s work is incredibly provocative because it incorporates many powerful contradictions into its visual language. It is at once proud and sombre, beautiful and melancholy. I see the artist’s paintings as a profound and personal negotiation between her cultures and her faith, for Malamoo, like many of her people, belongs to and inhabits several different worlds, which do not always dovetail so neatly. In our first conversation, Malamoo was rueful of her strict Christian schoolmasters, but serene in her continuing faith. Such a diasporic upbringing clearly informs her work, which depicts her people with a glowing, shimmering surface, gatherings around churches and fields, not unlike her Burdekin upbringing. Malamoo’s lush use of colour invokes Gauguin, inverting the typical Euro-centric stratagem of cultural appropriation, yet her work is far from being mere pastiche.

Malamoo’s work, of course, examines her community’s spiritual wounds, and their incredible resilience and remarkable generosity. The truism ‘home is where the heart is’ emphasises the hurt that Malamoo’s people endured as a culture and as a community. Kidnapped from their South Sea Island homes and forced to work on ships, shipyards and cane fields, Malamoo’s people were subjected to brutal conditions, often separated from their families and loved ones, with no recourse, no remedy, no justice. Later, under the thennew White Australia policy, they were then categorised as not being citizens of Australia, essentially rendering people of the South Sea Islands as stateless, a cruel irony for unwilling travellers.

This is something to consider while you take in Malamoo’s beautiful paintings; now, more than ever we must remember the past and learn from it. Malamoo’s work to is put into stark relief to our current,

so-called social-distancing practices; paintings of groups of people together, in the name of spirituality, family, community or religion, seems light years away from where we now find ourselves. Indeed, even launching this exhibition and managing visitor numbers within the gallery numbers belies the importance and gravity of Malamoo’s work. All of this underscores these shimmering, glowing works of art, and the remarkable woman who made them.

It truly has been a treat working with Shireen and my team to make this exhibition happen. I am certain that you will enjoy these works as much as I have.

Jonathan McBurnie

Church People [detail] 2019 - 2020

Oil and acrylic on canvas

76 x 76.3 cm

Portrait of Shireen’s mother, Esther Henaway Artist unknown

Assembly of God Church Congregation, Plantation Creek, Ayr, c.1930s

Back row, left: Shireen’s father, Alfred Henaway

Second row, right: Barbara Henaway and Grace Henaway

A belief in a higher power | Appeasement of justice | Slave trade | The sacred 2018 Oil and acrylic on canvas

89 x 116.4 cm

When I was introduced to Shireen Malamoo and first encountered her works, I was instantly enamoured. I felt honoured to meet her. Shireen is a bold and vivacious woman and artist. She is incredibly inspiring, witty, and maintains a solid sense of self. Shireen tells it like it is, straight up and down, no time wasted. This boldness and transparency, which encompasses her persona, is how she says she has always been. As a young girl, she was raised in the strict Pentecostal community of Plantation Creek, Ayr, in the Burdekin Region of North Queensland. With a reputation as a rebel and the resident troublemaker, she was not afraid to question the rules, pushing gendered boundaries of what was allowed, or expected, of women. Harbouring a fervent passion for music, Shireen loved to sing and to perform, especially gospel and jazz. Deep in her heart also lay the desire to travel and meet new people, to explore beyond what she knew, and to inspire, encourage, and forge real change within the world. It is wonderful to see that her cheeky attitude, strong intellect, and sharp sense of humour has been maintained through an artistic lifetime and is celebrated here today.

WORK IS A HEALER

Lucy Belle Tesoriero

Shireen is of Aboriginal and South Sea Island Kanaka1 descent, born in North Queensland in 1936. She is one of eleven children to Alfred and Esther Henaway. Alfred’s mother, Alice Santo, was Aboriginal, belonging to the Juru Clan of the Birri Gubba Tribe of Budgenerra, Cape Upstart, in the Whitsunday Region. Alfred’s father, Michael Henaway (Micky Eowra), was from the village of Lounapiktuan in West Tanna in the New Hebrids, now Vanuatu (arrived Aust. 1873). Esther Henaway (Backo/Kap) was high priestess of the chief bloodline of Tongoa through her father, Pakoa Kap.

The juxtaposition of Shireen’s maternal religious heritage and her Pentecostal upbringing would prove to be a conflicting yet inspiring influence to her life, psyche, and her art.

Pentecostalism arrived in Australia in the early 1900’s and became particularly established in the North Queensland region, espousing messages of healing, baptism, and the divine. It was in 1924 that the movement arrived in the Burdekin region through European salvationist, Annie Dennis.

Shireen’s sister, Shirlin Backo (Henaway), remembers when her uncles, Charlie and Norman, along with Annie Dennis, moved in with the family:

“Sister Dennis who was a divorcee came from Ingham and brought Pentecostalism. Mum and Dad took her out and put a curtain across one room so that she had a room. She stayed with us…and people would come to our house for prayer meeting until she moved into town.”2

Years later, the prayer meetings organised by Dennis were moved to the original Pentecostal Church on Wickham Street, Ayr.3

Under the church’s conservative regime, the women working on the plantation stripped cane, cleaned houses, and cared for the infants of the white families. They were taught to work hard and to never complain, to “get to work or get to church.” Shireen tells me that not all of the family conformed to the Christian beliefs willingly, but some members adopted these values and discipline ultimately for their own welfare. Their lives made ostensibly easier if they embraced an adherence.

1 The term Kanaka means “human being” in the Hawaiian language, and is the term used to refer to the workers from various Pacific and South Sea Islands employed by British colonies, most notably in North Queensland, Australia, in the 19th and early 20th centuries. Most Kanaka in Australia were recruited from the Solomon Islands, Vanuatu, and New Caledonia. The word Kanaka is considered a derogatory term, otherwise only to be used in its historical context. However, recently the term is being reclaimed and used by contemporary descendants as a term of strength and empowerment.

2 Martin Grandelis, The Henaway Journey, Slavery to Freedom, Darkness to Light, National Library of Australia, 2019, p39

3 Ibid

She points out that though they were united under the church’s teachings, segregation was rife, “they would teach us of walking through the gates of heaven, but we weren’t even allowed to sit on the same pew.”

Despite such obstacles, the family developed a sense of identity and community, and as the generations continued, so did the teachings of Christianity.

Shireen describes how, as a child, she would sit in the back of the church, in the pews reserved for the black workers, and be mesmerised by the white women during the services. As an enamoured voyeur, she would eye these ladies writhing and undulating with the energy of the Lord flowing through their bodies, erupting in song, and speaking in tongues. The image of these flailing women clad in all white, would make a lasting impression and would come to feature heavily in her art.

I asked Shireen to describe her feelings about being raised in a strict Pentecostal Christian community, being forced to conform to this colonial regime, and how this was impressed to her and her siblings. She replied that she was raised to have great pride in herself, to appreciate the opportunities she had been given, and to make the most of any situation.

Shireen’s mother was stern, “had a mouth like a steel trap”, and would always speak her mind. She had an armoury of retorts to her whinging children, “shut your mouth and read your bible”, “shut up and take a whinging pill”, “work is a healer”, and would remind them by maintaining a strong work ethic and religious devotion, that they would thus honour the struggles of their ancestors and make them proud.

I was intrigued as to how Shireen processed the often-opposing beliefs of her Christian upbringing and her Indigenous heritage. She said that she sees both as ribbons of her history. She is a highly spiritual individual but does not define her beliefs through either lens, though she is quite partial to Christian gospel choir. She further says that the traditions of the Vanuatu people, the stories of the Dreamtime, and the pagan rituals of Pentecostalism are not that dissimilar in ways, and as such, her people more or less amalgamated all three spiritual veins. She said that all three contain their own version of pouri pouri4, and that was important.

Pentecostalism offers a charismatic and emotional worship experience of congregational assembly, with customs of choral song, dancing in the pews, clapping, and speaking in tongues. The holy spirit and

4 According to Shireen, pouri pouri means magic or sorcery, often in reference to communication with ancestral spirits. 5 Conversations between Barry Henaway and Martin Grandelis, Ayr, 23 November 2018. Op. Cit. Grandelis, p42 6 Ibid

its invocation is a crucial element to sermons, where the pastor will call upon such to guide the zealous congregation. Shireen tells me that her community had woven their ancestral spirits and forms of witchcraft or sorcery into the beliefs of the church and that “there was a lot of mixing of Jesus and pouri pouri.”

This spiritual hybrid was widely practised and often called on in a variety of ingenious ways to control the behaviour of exuberant, enthusiastic, and irreverent young children,

“Many of us kids saw spirits, and older people reinforced this by telling us about their experience of the spirit world.”5 Shireen’s cousin, Barry Henaway, remembers fearing evil spirits, “When we were young, we used to believe there were devils down by the creek (Plantation Creek) and we would hide under our mother’s skirt so devils couldn’t get us.”6

Shireen was raised in this religious environment to have strong morals and an honest heart. This attitude has remained with her throughout her life, manifesting into her daily sense of pride and positive outlook. All that which underpin and channel into Shireen’s social work and altruistic contributions to the world. It is ultimately through this output that Shireen believes she can honour her ancestors as her mother taught her.

“they would teach us of walking through the gates of heaven, but we weren’t even allowed to sit on the same pew.”

What you fought for, I will repay

Shireen fled the plantation in her early twenties, but the spirits of her ancestors remained providential and close, “the spirit people” she says, “they’re all around us all the time.” A relationship that would become her driving artistic influence, along with the earlier mentioned childhood memories of the gesticulating female patrons of the church.

When Shireen left North Queensland in the early 1960’s, she settled in Redfern, Sydney. It was in this charged new environment where she quickly discovered a role to fulfill, to be a passionate champion for Indigenous social justice and inclusive education advocacy.

Over the years, she has been employed in numerous advisory roles between Sydney and Townsville, including local and state government departments and community welfare groups, specifically, the Department of Social Security (1970’s) the Secretariat of National Aboriginal and Islander Child Care and Finance Committee, she held the title Commissioner of the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Commission- ATSIC (1991-1993), sat on the NSW Parole board for nine years (1994-2003), worked with the Aboriginal Legal Service, Aboriginal Media Association, Aboriginal Medical Services, Justice Health Board, the Ethics Committee of the Aboriginal Health & Medical Research Council of NSW, and is a Board Member of the Roberta Sykes Indigenous Education Foundation.

In 2011, Shireen worked with the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Island Advisory Panel where she successfully campaigned for Lord Clover Moore to describe the historical Australian settlement as an “invasion” in the City’s 2030 plan.7

Shireen is a founding board member of the Australian South Sea Islanders, Port Jackson (ASSI.PJ) with chairwoman Emelda Davis, founded in 2009. Through the ASSI.PJ, Shireen advocates for official recognition of Australia’s blackbirding trade; the country’s largely ignored history of transporting Pacific and South Sea Islanders to work as indentured labour in the sugar cane plantations of North Queensland and northern New South Wales between 1863 and 1906. The descendants of the 62,500 Islanders transported to work in the cane fields, many of whom either died or were deported when the White Australian Policy came into effect, have not only long struggled to have their existence and legacy recognised and validated, but also to have their contribution to the foundation of Australia’s economic success acknowledged.

Many South Sea Islanders who had worked under such tough conditions in the sugar cane industry were left on various Pacific islands arbitrarily, once again dislocating them from their people and culture.8

According to the ASSI.PJ, some families have been here for six generations and “restitution issues such as unpaid wages from the Queensland government, dual citizenship, and reunification with families remain unresolved.”9 Upon discussing this with Shireen, she describes blackbirding as a “conveniently forgotten history of Australia”, and that “most Australians are familiar with the American slave trade but do not know that these acts also took place right here on our own soil.”

She says in an interview for the Saturday Paper in 2019:

“It’s not talked about, but we took slavery from the United States. Slavery finished in America the same year it started here. The thinking was ‘Just bring some blackfellas in, they can do it.’ The attitude that black people are lazy…Well, who did the work? Look at the economic base black people brought to Australia.”

7 Alex McKinnon, Weet-Bix and pastries with Australian South Sea Islanders- Port Jackson founding board member Aunty Shireen Malamoo, 23-29 March 2019, see references for full citation

8 Jeremy Eccles, Wild Deadly Woman at Agathon, Agathon Gallery, Sydney, 2011

9 Matt Poll, ASSI.PJ member and curator of the Sydney University’s Indigenous Collection at Macleay Museum, see reference for full citation

“

. ”

Spirit Pouri Pouri women at the well, Plantation Creek 2018

Oil and acrylic on canvas 65 x 95 cm

Alice Santo 1888 - 1966

Juru

Clan

Married 1904 (5 Children)

Michael Henaway 1857 - 1921

Tongoa Vanuatu

Pakoa Kap Sarah Lemarla 1871 - 1951

Married 19th Century (4 Children)

Alfred Henaway 1905 - 1973

This family tree has been simplified for this publication. For the full Henaway family tree, please see reference, Grandelis, The Henaway Journey, 2019

Married 16 Jan 1926 (11 Children)

Esther Backo (Kap) 1907 - 1985

Shireen Henaway (Malamoo)

1936 -

The true recruitment processes and treatment of workers is opaque and hotly debated. Some records show employed and indentured labourers for the sugar cane, pastoral, and maritime industries, while other oral intergenerational records conflict this information with harrowing narratives of abduction and transport to Australia. These families such as Shireen’s reveal that forms of unnecessary coercion were used prior to the the South Sea Islander Protection Act of 1872 where acts of bribery, intimidation, deadly-force, and destruction were insidiously employed.10 11

After forty years of active involvement in a range of organisations which served to progress Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander welfare in the region, Shireen decided pull back from her relentless schedule. It was in this retirement that she was able to fulfil her artistic passions, the genesis of which lay in some of her earliest memories. The accomplished jazz singer and musical performer lent her hand to painting, and as with her other creative pursuits, she harbours a natural talent.

She began to prolifically articulate her memoirs through her painting, influenced by her social justice advocation, and the intersecting rivers of her Aboriginal, Kanak, and European lineage and ancestral narrative,

“I began painting several years ago because I wanted something for myself, my family, and my people. My work is increasingly where I go to pull back from my busy life in the community. They allow me to reflect and create out of things that I think and dream. My art depicts the political and spiritual experiences of my life…the figures are the spirits of those who came before us…they’re invisible presences all around us, but larger than life…some from the past are of people in trauma; some like those in the community

around here...others are heroic, symbolic of courage and vision for Aboriginal and Vanuatu empowerment.”12

I cannot help but think of the brilliantly articulated contemplation by artist and art theorist, Wassily Kandinsky, from his essay titled Concerning the Spiritual in Art, in which he explores the notion of art as a spiritual anchor, a grounding and fulfilling pursuit, when all other certitudes of life are unhinged by social and cultural upheaval:

“When religion, science and morality are shaken…and when the outer supports threaten to fall, man turns his gaze from externals in on to himself. Literature, music and art are the first and most sensitive spheres in which this spiritual revolution makes itself felt. They reflect the dark picture of the present time and show the importance of what at first was only a little point of light noticed by few and for the great majority non-existent. Perhaps they even grow dark in their turn, but on the other hand they turn away from the soulless life of the present towards those substances and ideas which give free scope to the non-material strivings of the soul.”13

Shireen is not a trained artist, instead she relies on her instinct, “It’s almost like you’re dreaming what you’re painting. I don’t draw on my canvas. I paint like I’m dreaming. It would be peculiar to most artists.”

Her work is vibrant in colour, and bold in abstraction. Each piece radiates with soul and emotion. Forgoing meticulous pre-planning in her artistic process, Shireen instead reveals that, ancestral spirits guide her hand, manifesting through the canvas as ethereal silhouettes. For Shireen, her art – painting and singing - is a form of nourishment to the soul, a reflective meditation of sorts.

Another passage from Kandinsky seems relative:

“The spiritual life, to which art belongs and of which she is one of the mightiest elements, is a complicated but definite and easily definable movement forwards and upwards. This movement is the movement of experience. It may take different forms, but it holds at bottom to the same inner thought and purpose.”14

It is now 2020, and I sit here with Shireen in her home in Townsville, having returned from Redfern last year. She tells me that although her pace has slowed at age 84, she has not given up advocating or teaching, or pushing for recognition of Australia’s history in the domestic slave trade. With this exhibition Work is a Healer, we hope to highlight Shireen’s engaging and palpable artistry, and thus engage with the difficult conversations which permeate our country’s past, and to illuminate the struggles which have permeated Shireen’s life and ultimately fuelled her body of work.

10 Kay Saunders, Chapter 2, A Decent Cargo, Patterns of Melanesian Recruitment to Queensland 1863-1904 from Workers in Bondage, The Origins and Bases or Unfree Labour in Queensland 1824-1916, University of Queensland Press, St Lucia, 2013

11 Reid Mortensen, Slaving in Australian Courts: Blackbirding Cases, 1869-1871 from the Journal of South Pacific Law, Volume 4, 2000

12 Op. Cit. Eccles

13 M.T.H. Sadler (trans.) Wassily Kandinsky, Concerning the Spiritual in Art, Dover Publications, Inc, New York, 1977

14 Ibid

References

ASSIPJ Board Members 2020, Shireen Malamoo, Australian South Sea Islanders- Port Jackson, available at http://www. assipj.com.au, accessed 18/12/2019

Artist Profile: Shireen Malamoo, South Sydney Herald, June 2008, available at http://www.southsydneyherald.com.au, accessed 18/12/2019

Emelda Davis, Australia’s hidden history of slavery: the government divides to conquer, 01/11/2017, NITV Article, SBS, available at http://www.sbs.com.au/article/2017/11/01, accessed 18/12/2019. Original article is the fourth in the Black Lives Matter Everywhere series, a collaboration between The Conversation, the Sydney Democracy Network, and the Sydney Peace Foundation, available at http://theconversation.com/au/topics/black-lives-mattereverywhere-44608

Jeremy Eccles, Wild Deadly Woman at Agathon, Agathon Gallery, Sydney, 2011

Martin Grandelis, The Henaway Journey, Slavery to Freedom, Darkness to Light, National Library of Australia, 2019

Peter Griffin, Pondering the art of Shireen Malamoo, South Sydney Herald, August 2009, available at http://www. southsydneyherald.com.au, accessed 18/12/2019

Alex McKinnon, Weet-Bix and pastries with Australian South Sea Islanders- Port Jackson founding board member Aunty Shireen Malamoo, 23-29 March 2019, available at https:// www.thesaturdaypaper.com.au/2019/03/23/aunty-shireenmalamoo/15532596007862, accessed 18/12/2019

Reid Mortensen, Slaving in Australian Courts: Blackbirding Cases, 1869-1871, the Journal of South Pacific Law, Volume 4, 2000, University of South Pacific 1998-2006

Matt Poll, The Call for Recognition of the Australian South Sea Islander Peoples: A Human Rights Issue, ASSI.PJ member and curator of Sydney University’s Indigenous Collection at Macleay Museum. This forum was hosted by Sydney University, 20 August 2013, and marked the 150th anniversary of the beginning of Blackbirding. Renowned ASSI historian Professor Clive Moore, human rights activist and former journalist Jeff McMullen, community member Shireen Malamoo, and Queensland representatives Paula Viti and Professor Gracelyn Smallwood were be among those who discussed the need to give the ASSI people recognition.

M.T.H. Sadler (trans.) Wassily Kandinsky, Concerning the Spiritual in Art, Dover Publications, Inc, New York, 1977, republication of the first English translation published by Constable and Company Limited, London, 1914 under the title The Art of Spiritual Harmony

Kay Saunders, Chapter 2, A Decent Cargo, Patterns of Melanesian Recruitment to Queensland 1863-1904 from Workers in Bondage, The Origins and Bases or Unfree Labour in Queensland 1824-1916, University of Queensland Press, St Lucia, 2013

Family photo

Back left: Shireen’s father, Alfred Henaway

Back Right: Shireen’s paternal grandmother, Alice

Religion silenced on racism | Tell the truth and we all grow up 2018 Oil and acrylic on canvas 92 x 182 cm

Appeal to higher power | Black elegance | Pray | Keep your mouth shut there are people worse off than you 2018 Oil and acrylic on canvas

86 x 86.3 cm

Opposite:

Born astride the grave | Strong indication to do right and you go to heaven or hell is waiting 2018

Oil and acrylic on canvas

94 x 91.5 cm

Black people of elegant grace 2018

Oil and acrylic on canvas

63 x 89 cm

Opposite: Family on Plantation Creek, Ayr, North Queensland | Deep potency of the unknowable nd Oil and acrylic on canvas

123 x 123 cm

Human nature’s search for signs of a higher power | Soothe the dying pillow 2018 Oil and acrylic on canvas

86.4 x 101.7 cm

Power of prayer 2018 Oil and acrylic on canvas 85.4 x 87.3 cm

Spirit country | Secret energy of country 2019 – 2020

Oil and acrylic on canvas

90 x 160 cm

Women of Plantation Creek 2019 - 2020

Oil and acrylic on canvas 76 x 101.5 cm

Strong Families 2018

Oil and acrylic on canvas

62 x 90 cm

Stoic women on Plantation Creek, Town Camp, Ayr, North Queensland | Beautiful view of water lilies nd

Oil and acrylic on canvas

84.8 x 99.7 cm

Opposite: Church People 2019 - 2020 Oil and acrylic on canvas 76 x 76.3 cm

Thanks for life 2019 – 2020

Oil and acrylic on canvas

76.5 x 102 cm

In deep prayer 2019 – 2020

Oil and acrylic on canvas 81 x 107 cm

Hope 2019 – 2020 Oil and acrylic on canvas 76.5 x 76.1 cm

The Darkness | Tell the truth and we all grow up | Massacre of the Blacks in Australia 2018 Oil and acrylic on canvas 90.7 x 118.5 cm

Opposite: Untitled

Waiting for truth | Cover of slave trade 2018 Oil and acrylic on canvas 64.4 x 89.3 cm

nd Oil and acrylic on canvas 123 x 123 cm

Wisdom without bitterness | Cover of slave trade 2018 Oil and acrylic on canvas 64.5 x 92 cm

A choir to heal | Wisdom with bitterness 2018 Oil and acrylic on canvas 61.6 x 30 cm

List of Works

A belief in a higher power | Appeasement of justice | Slave trade | The sacred, 2018, oil and acrylic on canvas, 89 x 116.4 cm

A choir to heal | Wisdom with bitterness, 2018, oil and acrylic on canvas, 61.6 x 90 cm

Appeal to higher power | Black elegance pray | Keep your mouth shut there are people worse off than you, 2018, oil and acrylic on canvas, 86 x 86.3 cm

Black people of elegant grace, 2018, oil and acrylic on canvas, 63 x 89 cm

Born astride the grave | Strong indication to do right and you go to heaven or hell is waiting, 2018, oil and acrylic on canvas, 94 x 91.5 cm

Call to unknown, 2018, oil and acrylic on canvas, 101.5 x 76 cm

Church People, 2019 – 2020, oil and acrylic on canvas, 76 x 76.3 cm

Family on Plantation Creek, Ayr, North Queensland | Deep potency of the unknowable, nd, oil and acrylic on canvas, 123 x 123 cm

Hope, 2019 – 2020, oil and acrylic on canvas, 76.5 x 76.1 cm

Human nature’s search for signs of a higher power | Soothe the dying pillow | Best weapon, 2018, oil and acrylic on canvas, 86.4 x 101.7 cm

In deep prayer, 2019 – 2020, oil and acrylic on canvas, 81 x 107 cm

Ode to hope, nd, oil and acrylic on canvas, 80.5 x 86.5 cm cm

Power of prayer, 2018, oil and acrylic on canvas, 85.4 x 87.3 cm

Religion silenced on racism | Tell the truth and we all grow up, 2018, oil and acrylic on canvas, 92 x 182 cm

Spirit country | Secret energy of country, 2019 – 2020, oil and acrylic on canvas, 90 x 160 cm

Spirit Pouri Pouri women at the well, Plantation Creek, 2018, oil and acrylic on canvas, 65 x 95 cm

Strong Families, 2018, oil and acrylic on canvas, 62 x 90 cm

Stoic women on Plantation Creek, Town Camp, Ayr, North Queensland | Beautiful view of water lilies, nd, oil and acrylic on canvas, 84.8 x 99.7 cm

Thanks for life, 2019 – 2020, oil and acrylic on canvas, 76.5 x 102 cm

The Darkness | Tell the truth and we all grow up | Massacre of Blacks in Australia, 2018, oil and acrylic on canvas, 90.7 x 118.5 cm

Untitled, nd, oil and acrylic on canvas, 123 x 123 cm

Waiting for truth | Cover of slave trade, 2018, oil and acrylic on canvas, 64.4 x 89.3 cm

Wisdom without bitterness | Cover of slave trade, 2018, oil and acrylic on canvas, 64.5 x 92 cm

Women of Plantation Creek, 2019 – 2020, oil and acrylic on canvas, 76.5 x 102 cm

Galleries Team

Wendy Bainbridge Gallery Assistant

Jonathan Brown Education and Programs Assistant

Erwin Cruz Senior Collections and Exhibitions Officer

Rachel Cunningham Education and Programs Officer

Michael Favot Gallery Assistant

Veerle Jannsens Gallery Assistant

Dr Judith Jensen Team Manager, Arts

Jo Lankester Collections Management Officer

Amy Licciardello Business Support Officer

Chloe Lindo Gallery Assistant

Dr Jonathan McBurnie Creative Director

Jake Pullyn Exhibitions Officer, Projects

Sarah Reddington Senior Education and Programs Officer

Tanya Tanner Public Art Officer

Lucy Belle Tesoriero Curatorial Assistant

Leonardo Valero Exhibitions Officer