MY ACKNOWLEDGEMENT OF COUNTRY

I acknowledge my privilege in living on land stolen from the Gunaikurnai people in Metung East Gippsland; custodians for 120,000 years of respect and responsibility, care and connection to this place.

My gratitude for being welcomed by the oldest living culture in the world, holds me in obligation to learn, with permission, the humility in being one with country; to learn how to see country with my ears and hear country with my eyes, I acknowledge the Un-learning I need to do in deconstructing the colonising British and European migrant mindset I absorbed in my youth, echoing and ricocheting at every turn, every look.

Allowing silence when walking, so silence speaks, land wind water and everything speaks and is alive.

Arriving in Australia after many cultural experiences throughout Papua New Guinea in 1971, the culture shock I underwent enabled me to reassemble myself through making art at the South Australian School of Art, Adelaide. I acknowledge the power of this land is regenerating my spirit with an obligation to open to, respect and be in conversation with the land in my own backyard, down the Wallaby track or under the city!