The Artlink Archive Project: Tracking Indigenous voices

In winter 1984 Artlink reported on the Adelaide Festival/Fringe and Artist’s Week Forums including the session “Aboriginal Art: the Politics of Consumption and Display – How should Aboriginal art, past and present, be displayed in museums and art galleries?” Speakers were Cliff Coulthard, Maureen Watson, Mona Tur, Gordon Inkatji, Gary Foley (then recently appointed Chair of the Aboriginal Arts Board) and John [Djon] Mundine. It was one of Mundine’s first appearances in the magazine, where he has played a constant role as writer, critic, commentator, artist, co-editor, curator and historical witness for nearly forty years. But it’s as a curator that Mundine is best known, and for his catalytic role in the unequivocally political work, The Aboriginal Memorial (1986–88). Always provocative, Mundine was performing the ironic agitator while calling out hard truths in the lead-up to the 1988 Bicentenary: