December 3, 2024 • 37 mins
In this episode I yarn with Coby Edgar, a proud queer First Nations curator and cultural practitioner. Coby shares her journey from Darwin to Sydney, the intersection of art and activism, and the significance of storytelling in keeping history and culture alive. We explore her approach to curating community-driven exhibitions, the joy of working with mob, and her vision for fostering connection through art.
Coby's current exhibition, "Same, Same, Different," at the Blacktown Arts Centre, explores how people connect across cultures through shared experiences like food, traditions, and storytelling. This community-focused show emphasizes the beauty of diversity while celebrating commonalities, inspired by her conversations with mob and her uncle's insights on cultural overlaps.
The exhibition highlights the connections between people, place, and history, offering a joyful and thought-provoking perspective on identity and belonging. Don’t miss this incredible showcase of creativity and cultural dialogue!
Links & Resources:
- Bankstown Arts Centre website
- https://powerhouse.com.au/stories/durrmu-arts-aboriginal-corporation
- https://www.2022.australianceramicstriennale.com.au/presenters-and-artists/coby-edgar
Website: www.blackmagicwoman.com.au
Follow us on Instagram - @blackmagicwomanpodcast
The Black Magic Woman Podcast is hosted by Mundanara Bayles and is an uplifting conversational style program featuring mainly Aboriginal guests and explores issues of importance to Aboriginal people and communities. Mundanara is guided by Aboriginal Terms of Reference and focusses more on who people are rather than on what they do.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:04):
Black Cast, Unite our voices. Black Magic Walman Podcast acknowledges
the traditional owners of the land we have recorded this
episode on. We also acknowledge traditional owners of the land
where you, the listener or viewer are tuning in from.
We would like to pay our respects to our elders
past and present and acknowledged that this always was Aboriginal
(00:26):
land and always will be Aboriginal land.
Speaker 2 (00:29):
That's what I love about art.
Speaker 3 (00:30):
It gives the opportunity to have those discussions and not
being seen as angry or violent or you.
Speaker 2 (00:37):
Know, protesting.
Speaker 3 (00:38):
Is it really protesting when you're protesting your own body
or controversial?
Speaker 1 (00:45):
Welcome to the Black Magic Woman Podcast with Mandanara Bail.
Welcome back to another episode of the Black Magicalman Podcast.
I am here on Cameragle Country, which is in beautiful
Sydney also known as the Orination. I can't wait for
(01:05):
you to meet my next guest, and we've got a
few things that we were to unpack and even made
some connections before we press record. So I can't wait
for you to share a little bit about yourself. Sis
tell our listeners if you don't mine and have views
on YouTube, your name, your mob and a bit about
where you grew up.
Speaker 2 (01:24):
Yeah, hello and thank you for having me.
Speaker 3 (01:26):
My name is Kobe and Edgun and I'm a girl
from Darwin. I grew up in Darwen and moved when
I was about five years old to Adelaide. I've got
biggest mob family and lots of different I guess races,
all the naughty and nice and everything with a bit
of spice. So Filipino, Aboriginal from lat three different language groups, English, Austrian, Irish, Scottish,
(01:50):
a bit of everything.
Speaker 2 (01:52):
That melting pot of Darwin, you.
Speaker 1 (01:53):
Know it is it is. People say that the Darwin's
a melting pot and.
Speaker 2 (01:58):
Here I am.
Speaker 3 (02:00):
Yeah, yeah, big family it Adelade.
Speaker 1 (02:02):
You said you grew up.
Speaker 3 (02:03):
Yeah, when we moved to Adelaide or Tasmania for a year,
weirdly because my stepfather he grew up there and his
grandfather passed away.
Speaker 2 (02:11):
So we stayed there for like a year.
Speaker 3 (02:13):
And then moved to Adelaide and that's where I did
my high school and university studies and then wanted to
come to Sydney because I'm a big Boodoo queer and
wanted to run.
Speaker 1 (02:25):
A mark my family down here too. Do you know
Caira comes sing.
Speaker 3 (02:32):
I do know Caira. Yeah, she works up in Marley there. Yeah,
she's Brenda's niece, Brenda Croft's niece. Yeah, I know her
from around the track. She does deadly work over there.
She's clear too, one of our biggest mob queer todays
around here.
Speaker 1 (02:46):
Well, I marched to Marti Grass with her, that's deadily first.
It was actually a dream of mine to get on
that parade, but I just didn't want to be on
anyone's float. So I was on the float that actually
won for the best float, which one was.
Speaker 2 (03:02):
It was the memorial real float Okay, yeah, for a.
Speaker 1 (03:05):
Brother boy who passed away. Yes, I was on that one.
Speaker 2 (03:08):
Yeah, and my.
Speaker 1 (03:09):
Brother Greg Phillips was a queen on the front of it.
But my yeah, my lot of my family and community here.
I grew up partying in Oxford Street.
Speaker 2 (03:21):
I didn't get that, like they closed that down before
I could.
Speaker 1 (03:24):
Well, I was here then and it was the best.
Speaker 2 (03:26):
That's why I came.
Speaker 3 (03:27):
Because my uncle was just like you know, Uncle Gary Lee,
his beautiful uncle, great great artist as well. And he yeah,
when I was younger, he was I was had like
mohawk and wearing like butch clothes. And stuff, and he's like,
but I know you're not real feminine. But I know
you're not real butch either. So gave me Tiffany jewelry
and he's like you can be a bit of.
Speaker 2 (03:49):
A mix of both, you know. And I'm like, thanks uncle,
and he's like, you need to go to Sydney. I
grew up in Sydney.
Speaker 1 (03:55):
And go run on. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (03:58):
And then I was like, all right, oh, come Sydney,
lock out laws, no party.
Speaker 1 (04:02):
Terrible in Covid. I know.
Speaker 2 (04:05):
So woman, I'm married. Oh good, I did it. You
did it, you did it.
Speaker 1 (04:10):
Need the night live.
Speaker 3 (04:11):
No, I came to the Big Pond. I found myself
a fish and yes, you're not related. No, No, she's white.
Speaker 1 (04:19):
Because of the bloody stolen generation. Right, but we're here today,
and I know that you're doing a lot of work
in so many different spaces. Yeah, and you're representing out
there in Bankstown all over the shop, but living here
in Redfern.
Speaker 2 (04:37):
Yeah, living in Redfern. I've lived all over.
Speaker 3 (04:39):
When I moved to Sydney, I was working at the
Art Gallery of New South Wales. I was working for
Tracy Moffin. Actually she was doing the Venice Bionali and
I was one of her assistants. So I moved over
and then started working for the art gallery there for
like eight years. And during that time, when you land
in Sydney you just end up, you know, hop scotching
around the city. It's really hard to find your roots.
(05:01):
So I lived in Red fan fresh Water, over this
side and then all over you know, Australia Street in
Marrickville there with all the queers and all the lovelies there.
Speaker 2 (05:12):
My local pub was super queer. I loved it.
Speaker 3 (05:15):
Just a hop, skip and jump away from my house.
I could walk home at two o'clock in the morning
and be right yeah and have biggest mob.
Speaker 2 (05:22):
Fun with everyone. And then now I'm back in Redfern.
Speaker 3 (05:25):
I lived in Red Fernd with my one of my
sister girls, Nicole Monks, and she's an artist. She had
a little boy, little boy, Bitty Bitdy, at five years old,
and she's like, well, if you can deal with a kid,
you can come live with me.
Speaker 2 (05:37):
And I'm like, yeah, I'm right with kids.
Speaker 1 (05:38):
I got a lot of mob.
Speaker 2 (05:39):
Yeah, I'm right.
Speaker 3 (05:40):
She's like, in Sydney, most people don't want to live
with five year old kids and I'm like, oh, I
don't give.
Speaker 2 (05:43):
A start, Like I don't care.
Speaker 1 (05:46):
Serious side.
Speaker 2 (05:47):
I moved in and first thing I cooked for her.
Speaker 1 (05:49):
Now you're auntie.
Speaker 3 (05:50):
Yeah, chili mudcrab first meal. And now that kid loves
his seafood, he's full. I'm getting him, like Darwin Palette.
Speaker 1 (05:58):
Yeah, making sure because there's that kind of Malaysian Indonesian.
There's even Chinese japan influence.
Speaker 2 (06:04):
Yeah we're Asian.
Speaker 3 (06:06):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (06:06):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (06:07):
We traded with Silhouesi for two hundred years prior to colonization.
You know tripang ce cucumber that went all the way
up to China and back.
Speaker 2 (06:14):
And people don't talk about that.
Speaker 3 (06:16):
Because that is a really amazing piece of evidence of
us being, you know, a very well developed economy. We
had training, having international relations, We had international relations for
two hundred years prior to colonization. The mccasson move will
come over six months of the year and set up camp.
Our word for money is rupia, our word for suscils,
(06:37):
breast for milk, a word for milks.
Speaker 1 (06:42):
So their language became part of our local dialects and languages.
Speaker 3 (06:48):
And culture to like, you know, they traded still with us,
you know, steel all the there's like heaps, big history
of steel cloth, tobacco, you know, marriage as well. You
know they went over there and married up and had
family and were buried there and biggest story there.
Speaker 1 (07:07):
But there was a actual what do you call it
when there's a reunion. There was something in the early
nineties where the Darwin government flew over Indonesian people, about
six of them who were descendants of abersh On people, to.
Speaker 3 (07:25):
Honor that trade. Ye, yeah, that relationship. Yeah, we still
do it. Like I went to Gama two years ago
now and that Yeah, we had brother Abdi there. Abdi's
an artist and he came over and you know, did
that ceremony with the I think it was a good
much mob that he did it with.
Speaker 2 (07:42):
I can't remember, but you know that ceremony.
Speaker 3 (07:45):
So they you know, he did his dance and then
they had their reply and re enacted that meeting on
the beach that they'd usually have at the start of
a season.
Speaker 1 (07:53):
Did we watch that plant? We were there that year,
So we've been a garment at the same time.
Speaker 2 (07:58):
We've probably been walking down the street. You have not
even seen each other.
Speaker 1 (08:01):
Because Marrickville is like death but like the place to be.
Speaker 3 (08:05):
Yeah, I'm quiet person unless someone puts the camera in
front of my face and change.
Speaker 1 (08:09):
And the next minute, next minute. Yeah, so what are
you doing now?
Speaker 2 (08:13):
Like you're curating still, So I'm a curated by trade.
Speaker 3 (08:16):
So I finished high school and I was the first
person from my family to finish high school. Immediate family,
real geek like Choristar school captain type geek, proper geeks. Yeah, yeah,
high achiever, Yeah, I don't know b's and you know,
a couple of a's and caesar, but not hugely high
(08:36):
achiever in comparison to the rest of the world.
Speaker 1 (08:38):
But but what still and in a leadership position? Why
are you at school?
Speaker 2 (08:43):
I was in the you know, in the ring.
Speaker 3 (08:45):
I want to go so yeah, and then yeah, my
art teacher was like, you should probably do an arts
degree because I was like, I don't know what I
want to do. I like sports or my brothers and
art do sports my art, but you know, you can't
really make money from art. Maybe I'll be a teacher.
I've got a scholarship to do a teaching did one
(09:05):
term of it and was like, I can't do this.
If this woman tells me that I have to do
X Y and Z to teach a class. Like there's
so many different ways to teach something. It's just like
you can't do this, this and this, and I'm like
I can.
Speaker 1 (09:17):
I don't want to doubt that non completely different approach.
Speaker 3 (09:21):
Yeah, so I worked to Adelaide High School for ages
when I was a kid or kid eighteen nineteen, twenty
twenty one, and then yeah, it.
Speaker 2 (09:28):
Was like I'll just try curating.
Speaker 3 (09:29):
Like it's this big, kind of scary looking thing when
you look at curators and what they do, but Adelaide
was a good place to do it. I did Time
and Do Festival, which was the inaugural festival with Nicki
Compston there. I was twenty four. That was a huge
amount of experience for me. You know, I just roughed
it like most art curators for the first few years,
you know, six different jobs and in one calendar year
(09:52):
and having to apply for grants and just exhausted all
the time.
Speaker 2 (09:56):
But nothing changes.
Speaker 1 (09:58):
So there's no money as a curator, Like tell me,
it's like.
Speaker 3 (10:02):
All arts practices, like there's no money until you're the
top like ten percent, and everyone wants to wear something
that you've made or be in a room that you've curated.
Speaker 1 (10:10):
I can't. I didn't realize it. I know it's quite
I know the arts in Genue that a lot of
our mob in particular like Struggle.
Speaker 3 (10:21):
I'm basically ADMIN last, so it's like yeah, same same,
different as Admin.
Speaker 1 (10:26):
Yeah. So you're here in Sydney you're curating. Yeah, yeah,
what are you working on now? Anything that yeh can hear?
Speaker 2 (10:34):
There's so much we see.
Speaker 3 (10:36):
There's like the National Portrait Gallery down in Canberra. I've
just there's a show up at the moment with Joan
Ross and that's my first show working with a non
Indigenous person. Actually, she's Glaswegian and really really fun. She's
just a really good friend of mine, and she confronts
the colonial colonial agreed, the superiority superiority complexes that came
(10:56):
on the shores with those big boats, and how we've
ended up where we are today because of all of that.
And she's really good fun. I like working on with
different people. And you know, we've got that big Captain
cook that's like worth several million dollars hanging up next
to one that she's made out of krusty.
Speaker 1 (11:12):
Carpet at the National Gallery.
Speaker 2 (11:15):
National Portrait Gallery, National Portrait gallery.
Speaker 1 (11:18):
Is this where there was also a Gina Ryan Hank piece.
Speaker 2 (11:21):
Oh no, that's across the road, but yeah, from it.
Speaker 1 (11:24):
And she was demanding that they remove it. Yeah, and
they were like, but this is.
Speaker 2 (11:28):
Our it is Yeah, you can't. Sorry it did it?
Speaker 1 (11:31):
It went all around the world, didn't it. And now
more people have seen it. No one would have even
known that it was there. Nah.
Speaker 2 (11:37):
And she didn't kick up stick and he does portreous
like that. That's what it gave the.
Speaker 1 (11:40):
Artist, this kind of global spotlight and recognition.
Speaker 2 (11:44):
I was like, yeah, Vincent's really lovely.
Speaker 3 (11:47):
He's quite shy sometimes, but when he speaks he can
be very you know.
Speaker 2 (11:51):
His work's very serious as well. I've bumped into him
a fair bit.
Speaker 1 (11:56):
Through his grandson, your great grandson, grandson, great grandson, great
grandson for Albert Namage. Oh yeah, wow, you've met him.
Speaker 2 (12:06):
I've worked with talk about him.
Speaker 1 (12:08):
We do art tours. We need to connect.
Speaker 2 (12:11):
Yeah, that's been my career. Curators. That's what we do.
Speaker 3 (12:13):
We do art tours and explain art and write lots
of stuff and do heaps of research. I basically make
a beautiful space for people to tell their stories and
try to be the translator between their world and the
rest of the world.
Speaker 1 (12:27):
And the institutions all of it at the same time. Yeah,
you got to know how to navigate all of that. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (12:33):
So ten years working in institutions. Started at the Art
Gallery of South Australia, moved over to Art Gallery of
New South Wales and then Powerhouse. And I quit working
for institutions when the referendum happened and I just didn't
like the way that the world was, the politics were
treating our lives.
Speaker 2 (12:49):
And you know, yet again just who was showing up
for us?
Speaker 3 (12:53):
Yeah, And I was like, I can't keep working for
government if government doesn't work for me. And I've learned
the playbook. I know what you're about. I respect you,
but you can't have any more of my time.
Speaker 2 (13:05):
Sorry.
Speaker 1 (13:05):
My mum said you what do you keep your friends
close but your enemy is closer. But she also said
to go and learn the white men's ways.
Speaker 2 (13:16):
Well that's why I was there, and learn.
Speaker 1 (13:18):
And then come back and bring those skills or experiences
back to committityes. So the Powerhouse is was that more independent.
Speaker 3 (13:26):
The little brother, little brother of Art Gallery of New
South Wales. So back in the day, all right here
we go you want to hear about histories.
Speaker 2 (13:32):
Now.
Speaker 3 (13:34):
The first kind of ever gallery or space that held
objects in Sydney was in the Botanic Gardens and Jonathan
Jones made a really amazing work for the Cawdor Public
Art Projects, bar Angle Jara and it was about these
this building and this building had all of these artifacts
from Polynesia, Melanesia, huge building. It was during the time
when they first figured out how to make electricity.
Speaker 2 (13:54):
It fire, biggest fire. Everything went up only ash. That's it.
Speaker 3 (14:01):
It was that hot that fire and all of these
cultural artifacts died. And from there they set up the
Art Gallery Society, which became the Art Gallery of New
South Wales, which was the whole heap of you know,
people who were really keen on the arts and wanted
to collect art and wanted Sydney to be a hub
for art and be the place to be in Australia
for art. And then the Powerhouse Museum was established as
(14:23):
it's like brother and that's more about the activity of doing,
and you know they look more at processes of things,
so you know, one of their first big projects was
the Castle Hill site of eucalyp plantations and those eucalyid plantations.
They tested all the different eucalypt types to see, Okay,
which one's best for oils, which one's best for tannins,
which one's best for making houses with all of that
(14:45):
kind of scientific stuff, And the Powerhouse holds that knowledge,
and then the art gallery holds like, like I guess,
high art and expression of art in that context.
Speaker 1 (14:55):
Yeah, you see a lot of shows that were at
the Powerhouse, like it's a creative space.
Speaker 3 (15:00):
Yeah, it's about showing that process as well as the product,
which is why.
Speaker 1 (15:05):
Yeah, because there's like the Prisbone Powerhouse, Sydney Powerhouse, and
they all kind of connected to the galleries.
Speaker 2 (15:13):
No, not always.
Speaker 3 (15:15):
Those guys are just like they kind of established via
state or territory, and they're not always. They're all independent
from from themselves and kind of had different ways of establishing.
But a lot of the time it was to create
places for Australian art and to be housed.
Speaker 2 (15:33):
And the importance of that.
Speaker 3 (15:35):
Obviously goes back to the collecting and collecting institutions and
why do we collect who decided to collect things? It
wasn't you know, within indigenous culture, we most of our
objects are ephemeral for a reason.
Speaker 2 (15:48):
You know, they're meant to die after time.
Speaker 3 (15:50):
Whereas this kind of where did the collecting methodologies come from?
Their scientific methodologies of collecting, you know, and then now
we have these beautiful art galleries and museums. But the
hard of it is we first started to collect scientific things,
including people's bodies.
Speaker 2 (16:08):
Yes, and cultural artifiling heads.
Speaker 3 (16:11):
And that was a part of the colonial process. I
own this object now, and that it's a part of
my collection. This thing that where you think you own
it because you've got a sample of it, and that
idea of ownership, and that's a psychological thing. You know,
Black fellows might have a piece of land, but I
don't feel like you own it.
Speaker 1 (16:28):
It's like a paper. Yeah, I do you own a property.
You own the piece of paper, not the actual land.
Speaker 3 (16:35):
And what was colonization like it was you know, these
beautiful words written on a piece of paper that people
that spoken understood that language said all right, yeah, well
that makes sense to me, or right it must be true. Yeah,
move on, let's not ask the person that's actually you know,
the person being subjected to this thought or idea.
Speaker 1 (16:53):
And this is the beauty of art, right, that representation
still retelling you know, keeping history alive and keeping people accountable.
And I think that's an issue. It isn't is, Sue.
I don't think in this country where there's a massive
denial of our history, our shared history.
Speaker 2 (17:11):
I think that.
Speaker 1 (17:14):
You must get so much.
Speaker 2 (17:16):
It's an intellectual field. So like it.
Speaker 3 (17:18):
It's seemed different like so, I think R and B
is an intellectual field, but it's not necessarily appreciated as
such by you know, the white canon of what is
important to their lives and knowledge and systems and blah
blah blah. But art is art is something that we
can kind of meet them intellectually on a level. And
it's a really good football field for us to get
(17:40):
a few good tackles in because we can re evidence
what they've written in their books and put in their
museums and say, hey, hold on a second, right here,
you wrote that in your own words, and I've just
made an artwork about it. It's not political, it's just
the truth telling. So that's what I love about art.
It gives that opportunity to have those those discussions and
(18:01):
not being seen and angry or violent or you.
Speaker 2 (18:06):
Know, protesting.
Speaker 3 (18:07):
Is it really protest when you're protesting your own body
or controversial, it's not. So that's why I went into
the arts because and Richard Bell has this really great
quote he's amazing political artist.
Speaker 2 (18:18):
My uncle get out. Well then fuck you would know that.
Speaker 3 (18:21):
I do know.
Speaker 1 (18:22):
He's like all of his art.
Speaker 2 (18:23):
Why did he become an artist? Because he wouldn't get
arrested for saying what he wanted to say?
Speaker 1 (18:28):
Yeah, like he would have he has he become.
Speaker 2 (18:31):
He's like everyone loves him. He's like ooriginal arts uncle.
He's not just your uncle. We think he's all our uncle.
Speaker 1 (18:38):
He's like, yeah, we love He's kind of led the way.
One of many people that have been part of a
So he's part of Proper Now collective and they're in
Brisbane and there's a whole of deadly people.
Speaker 2 (18:49):
Marley's kind of like the Sydney version of.
Speaker 1 (18:51):
The sum version of Proper Now that it's I don't
know why though, like still in twenty twenty four that
people like uncle Richard seen is Oh that's a bit
provocative or that's a bit radical. It's truth telling and
that's the issue in this country. People don't don't feel
comfortable with some of the truths.
Speaker 3 (19:11):
Yeah, well, I guess that's what happens when you're not
used to I don't know, looking at your own privilege
and understanding why that might make you feel uncomfortable. Because
if you're uncomfortable from what he says, then maybe it's
because you should.
Speaker 1 (19:27):
Be self working. Yeah, and am soulf searching.
Speaker 3 (19:37):
That might need to happen, And it doesn't come from
anywhere either, Like even his bells serum is still popular today,
you know, you know Aboriginal LANs, A white thing is
what it says.
Speaker 2 (19:45):
And he's not wrong in a lot of senses.
Speaker 3 (19:47):
You know, arnam lend Mob they change their barks from
just being racked to putting in pictures of the animals
so that Blunders could try and figure it out easier.
So you know, he altered, they altered those specific paintings
to make it easier for Blunder Mob, not for their
own people.
Speaker 2 (20:06):
So it was the white thing to do that.
Speaker 3 (20:08):
And introduce those things to try and make it easier
for non indigenous people to understand us. Same with Uncle
Vincent then Albert Namajeera, his uncle, grandfather, great great grandfather,
he painted watercolors in that vein so that it could
be appreciated for like picturesque.
Speaker 2 (20:29):
He could paint dot paintings.
Speaker 3 (20:31):
He chose not to for a reason because it's easier
for people to see, Oh yeah, that's that range there,
that Mount Gillen Rangers, if you're a blunder, because you've
seen it with your eyes, than it is for you
to see it in their symbolic representations, which is dot paintings.
Speaker 1 (20:47):
And that's when we talk about abation art. It's it's versatile.
People have adapted, it's evolved. It's not just traditionally dot
painting anymore. So you see a lot of art these days,
like Honey Judy Watson like it is work. Yeah, she's
big bronze sculptures. You've got Megan Cope over on you
(21:09):
know Juba doing oysters and stuff. You've got weavers doing
all different art in the work that you're doing. Now.
I guess is there a massive art show happening?
Speaker 3 (21:23):
Is it?
Speaker 2 (21:24):
Yeah?
Speaker 3 (21:25):
Well on Saturday, we've got that same, same different show
at black Blacktown Arts Center, which is a Binali Blacktown
b and Aali actually and that's a it's not huge show,
but it's a it's it's more of a local community.
Speaker 2 (21:38):
It's a local community like art center.
Speaker 1 (21:41):
It's quite like there's a lot of people that are
engaged with it in the community.
Speaker 2 (21:45):
Yeah, yeah, that's why I want to see them.
Speaker 1 (21:47):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (21:47):
So usually most of my work I've done either like
you know, training people in desert, you know, how to
hang a painting, or you know, I like being at
bush most of the time. I'm not a curator who
likes to be you know over in New York, preferred
to be in your color.
Speaker 2 (22:05):
Thank you.
Speaker 3 (22:06):
And so when I work in institutions, a lot of
my work is focused in in cities and in big
buildings that are you know, made out of beautiful marble
that I'm scared I'll slip on.
Speaker 2 (22:18):
And so it's nice to go into the communities.
Speaker 3 (22:20):
And I've lived in Sydney for nearly eight years now
and I haven't had the opportunity to work with the
local arts center. I did a show out the Bearded Tit,
my favorite gay little pub courts to stop sucking.
Speaker 2 (22:33):
The black tit what it's called, That's.
Speaker 3 (22:35):
What it was called, Yeah, about how you know, people
need to get off the black tit and maybe you know,
start trying to find their own resources and shit.
Speaker 1 (22:46):
So some of these shows, right, that's taking a piss,
but it's humor.
Speaker 2 (22:50):
You need a bit of humor with all the trauma.
Speaker 3 (22:53):
And that's kind of what I've been doing a lot
with my work, is focusing on joy, like I can.
You know, I've studied art for long enough to know
I can be real serious and give a two hour
presentation on the steer of an artist. But that doesn't
move me, and I don't think it moves many people anymore.
I think we need a little bit of humor and
same same with different and different.
Speaker 1 (23:12):
You know.
Speaker 3 (23:12):
I was brought on by Rachel Kang there, she's the director.
She had a bit of an idea about what she
wanted to focus on and look at ways that different
people connect and people connect with nature in different cultures.
And I was like, I was sitting in Darwin with
my uncle Gary, and I was like, it's all just same, same, different.
(23:32):
But I was like, okay, yeah, that's the title of
the show. Uncle then and he's like well, I was like, uncle,
what do you mean by that? And he's like, well,
you know black follows that were colonized here, we eat rice.
Black follows on that side, they eat potatoes, same, same, different,
we all have these different ways of connecting with each other.
It's our ways of being doing a noyse if you
(23:53):
want to get into like axiologies, you know, ontologies, the
scientific ways of looking at it and pistemologies jumping into that.
Speaker 1 (24:02):
I reckon on Colin, that's cancer.
Speaker 2 (24:06):
On colleges.
Speaker 3 (24:07):
These big words they are, they're big words, but it's
just it's just the same, same, different Like I love.
Speaker 1 (24:13):
That the fact you're saying, you know, I can talk
this talk, go and present on this for two hours
and give a highly intellect your account of somebody's life,
or just go out bush and just be with mob.
Speaker 2 (24:25):
I'd just rather be with mob.
Speaker 3 (24:27):
Yeah, it's that's the where I get my joy from.
And so same, same different kind of looks at that
I want people to talk about. You know, I was
talking about the Siluesian our Indonesian.
Speaker 2 (24:40):
We're very Asian in Darwin.
Speaker 1 (24:41):
You know.
Speaker 3 (24:42):
The only reason I reckon that we're called like you know,
Australia is because of the colony.
Speaker 2 (24:46):
We actually are very Asian.
Speaker 1 (24:48):
We are in the Asian neighborhood.
Speaker 3 (24:50):
Yeah, we're closer to their mob over there than we
are to you know, people down in Tasmania. Yeah, so
we have that Asian culture and people forget about it.
And I'm like, you know all the way that people
migrate here and start families, especially people of color, same, same,
different a lot of the time, you know, getting away
from war, getting away from poverty, trying to start a
(25:11):
better life, whatever it is. And they have similarities within that. Also,
the way that we we pray, the way that we
religiously do things, you know, religious religion is you know,
the repetitive movements of something, you know, with intention, and
you know the way that we cook food together, the
way we prepare food. There's similarities. Blood chung is. We
(25:33):
could talk about blood chung for three hours, and you know,
just as a food. And how many different families have
different ingredients that they.
Speaker 2 (25:41):
Salty plums, yeah, saldi plums.
Speaker 1 (25:44):
Everyone eats soldi plums most people in Yeah. I love
soldy plums.
Speaker 2 (25:48):
That was our lollies.
Speaker 1 (25:49):
My husbands Fijian, he loves salty plums.
Speaker 2 (25:52):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (25:53):
I was like, what the heck? Olia, the lemon with vinegar,
some salt, nah, but not salty plums.
Speaker 2 (26:02):
No, salti plums are grow up on them.
Speaker 1 (26:04):
Just had miss Staple and your teeth for red.
Speaker 3 (26:07):
Teeth a red all the time, Yes, stains on your hands,
the day's taste.
Speaker 2 (26:12):
Yeah, used to they were our lollies. You know, we
didn't have like you know.
Speaker 1 (26:16):
They're an Asian.
Speaker 2 (26:17):
Yeah, they're dried plums, dried plums. They're dried preserved.
Speaker 3 (26:20):
Plums with heaps of salt on them so they're super
sour and put them in your mouth and mango dried mango.
Speaker 1 (26:26):
Pray for salty plums, I know, Yeah, I pray for
salti plums.
Speaker 2 (26:29):
I've got salty plums. They're just sitting in there when
I miss home.
Speaker 1 (26:32):
Yeah, here in Sydney, there is a community here and
you're mentioning like it's rewarding and you get joy from
being with MOB. Do you ever get to go back home.
Speaker 2 (26:43):
All the time?
Speaker 1 (26:44):
Yeah?
Speaker 3 (26:44):
I do because I work in the arts and well
and Tea's kind of a hub for you know, to
to scatter from there if you want to go to
art centers.
Speaker 2 (26:55):
So I go home a.
Speaker 3 (26:55):
Lot because if I want to work with MOB, I
try to go out there and make sure that my
projects I'm going out there. I don't like being a
cue reader who just sits there and is like I
want five of those beautiful bags from that community by
this date, thank you very much. Like I need to
go there and with that relationships and.
Speaker 1 (27:15):
Is there advice then for our mom who might want
to work in this space.
Speaker 3 (27:21):
What if there's so much work there? Honestly, there's so
much work, Come and join me. Honestly, I love it.
It's good fun. There's different ways that you can curate. Like,
I'm not a very serious curator. I like to have
fun with my work. I have a joke, you know,
I do some writing, I'm on stage sometimes you can.
Speaker 2 (27:37):
There's lots of different things you can do. I'm sitting
here talking to you.
Speaker 3 (27:40):
You know.
Speaker 2 (27:40):
I thought i'd be a book bitch, but I'm.
Speaker 1 (27:42):
Not self in point your own boss.
Speaker 2 (27:44):
Yeah, I'm independent.
Speaker 1 (27:45):
Independent.
Speaker 3 (27:46):
I work part time for Agency Projects, which is just
made a move to advertise for its first CEO indeed CEO.
So please, if you know anyone who's deadly that wants
to come work with me and Leila and Mately and
the team, we're looking for a deadly indigenous CEO really
in Melbourne National Remit. I work part time for them,
(28:07):
and then the rest of the time I do things
like this. Yeah, Bankstown working with Joan Writing. I do
lots of writing. I love writing.
Speaker 1 (28:15):
And what do you do with the writing?
Speaker 2 (28:16):
I write about artists?
Speaker 3 (28:18):
Yeah, I write essays for artists, write diaristically as well
about people like you. Today you're like, I'm not going
to read your bio. You can introduce yourself. Yeah, the credentials,
that's a big part of like being advertising yourself, I
think as a person nowadays, and I don't think it
comes well for black fellows at all.
Speaker 2 (28:36):
Yeah, I don't do it. I've refuse to do it.
Speaker 3 (28:38):
You know, some will sit there and to you and
be like I did this and I did that, and
like you can google me if you really want to,
but maybe just get to know me as a person
and if you like me, then work with me.
Speaker 1 (28:47):
Well that's the thing, right, relationships.
Speaker 2 (28:49):
Yeah, and I prefer those things.
Speaker 3 (28:51):
And you know, just the kind of credentials freaks me
out a little bit, so I try it away.
Speaker 1 (28:57):
It's a kind of waderline where you're big noting it is.
I know, when you're growing up in community, you kind
of I don't know, there's something about our culture where
there's this kind of humbleness about it.
Speaker 3 (29:07):
You can't pretend like you're better than the person that
sits next to you, even if they otherwise.
Speaker 1 (29:11):
People said, we're supposed to come from.
Speaker 3 (29:12):
Yeah, it's no, that's not how we work for you.
So it's like, yeah, a bit weird trying to do curating.
But the curating is good fun. You get really good opportunities,
Like I've traveled so much. I've gotten to see so
many different parts of the world, had so many amazing opportunities.
Speaker 1 (29:27):
Favorite country. Is there a favorite country? It has to
be had outside of this butiful place.
Speaker 2 (29:34):
No, honestly, I just got I get home.
Speaker 1 (29:37):
Nowhere else in the world you could go. That was
like reminding me of home. Now.
Speaker 3 (29:43):
I liked Singapore because people looked like me, and I
like their food, like they have amazing food. I could
just live there and eat all day every day. Yeah,
that was good fun.
Speaker 1 (29:52):
My kids are looking for the next holiday.
Speaker 2 (29:54):
Oh is that what you ask?
Speaker 1 (29:55):
So they're asking. One wants to go to Singapore, one
wants to go to Thailand, and the other one wants
to go to Japan.
Speaker 2 (30:01):
So I've been to Japan.
Speaker 1 (30:02):
Japan.
Speaker 2 (30:02):
It's good too.
Speaker 3 (30:03):
Yes, that's real deadly, Yes, that's freak out though, Like
it's not for like, you know, going into nature or anything. Yeah,
you want to go to all the big mulls and
stuff and eat all the fruit.
Speaker 1 (30:13):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (30:14):
And then Singapore a bit same, but they've got like
it's freaky city because it's real multicultural. It's kind of
like you know how Venice was like a you know,
a port for people to come in and out of.
Speaker 2 (30:23):
It's a bit like that, and but heaps of Asian mob.
Speaker 3 (30:26):
So it's like, I don't know, I've traveled overseas to
plenty of places, but I'm like racially ambiguous, like people
can't pick me like from and so it's like being
around places where I can blend.
Speaker 2 (30:40):
In weirdly, like yeah, another radar. Sometimes we went to
Belgium with my wife a couple of weeks ago, and
I did not like it at all.
Speaker 1 (30:47):
It was just different.
Speaker 2 (30:48):
Liken, Like I just didn't enjoy it.
Speaker 3 (30:50):
I'm like, you can't no birds, no trees, like no
one had dogs walking down the street.
Speaker 2 (30:55):
I don't know, just weird. Just everything was brick and beer.
It's like and I'm like that's good, Like you've got
beautiful culture here.
Speaker 1 (31:02):
That's part of that's the that's what they do.
Speaker 3 (31:04):
I don't want a street market, not a pub. I
don't know, so yeah, that's what I like. I guess preference,
personal preference.
Speaker 1 (31:11):
I just I know that a lot of listeners are
going to be like blown away that you've makes people
just kind of don't think blackfellows can do what you do,
can do what I do, travel to twenty different countries,
you know, like there's so limited. A lot of people
are very limited. They're thinking of what we can do
(31:31):
and achieve, and it's sounded one thing, but at the
same time doesn't bother me.
Speaker 3 (31:35):
I'm just fluking at this, Like honestly, I've been fluking
it since day one, and.
Speaker 2 (31:39):
I don't keep going.
Speaker 1 (31:40):
I don't have that plan.
Speaker 2 (31:41):
I just do what I love to do.
Speaker 3 (31:42):
I try and challenge myself, and you know, if someone
says that I'm stupid, I try and prove them wrong,
which is probably why I ended up very successful academically,
you know. But now I'm in my thirties and I'm
moving out of that and I'm comfortable. You know, I've
proven to myself that I can get these really good
(32:02):
jobs and go and do all these really deadly things.
And now I just want to work with mob again
and young people again and be like, it's hard work,
but it's fulfilling work, and there's heaps of jobs out
there in the arts. It's a really good space for
you to work on yourself and your community as well,
because you have to. When you're working in arts, you're
(32:22):
not doing a skilled job for hire. You're talking about
something that belongs to you, your identity, and you belong
to that community as well. So it can also be
really fulfilling moralistically for yourself.
Speaker 1 (32:35):
Getting people to reconnect if they're not connected to community.
That's probably a good way to wrap up the art
because a lot of our mob, especially that come to
the big cities, a lot of them don't come with
much family or something and they've got to start from scratch.
So I hope that some of the people that are
listening are inspired about what you've been doing and all
(32:56):
the things you've achieved. And you're only in your thirties.
I'm like far but I don't get to many people
here that are in Sydney that are doing the things
that you've done. And I think listeners are probably thinking, wow,
where have you been? How do we connect? So do
you have a website? How do people reach out to
you on your socials?
Speaker 2 (33:15):
Yeah, you can jump on my Instagram.
Speaker 3 (33:17):
It's bou which means some associ in Lalarakia language or
old people it means something else.
Speaker 1 (33:24):
Yeah, how do you spell it?
Speaker 2 (33:26):
B d ju?
Speaker 1 (33:29):
Would you?
Speaker 2 (33:30):
Yeah?
Speaker 1 (33:31):
You know you know what budgiegen is.
Speaker 2 (33:34):
Yeah, yeah, it's all purpose. When you went in.
Speaker 1 (33:40):
Brisbane right when you're Bourdill your ship, yeah, damn it.
So where people going, hey are you Budell? When I
was like under the Murray School leaving Redford, I'm like,
am I bud What do you mean? Am I bouder?
Speaker 2 (33:51):
So there was this is going to make you laugh?
Speaker 3 (33:53):
So means vagina in Larakia from old ways, yes, and
then it was appropriated by heaps of black queer mob
to mean sexy. So lots of like queer black men
are like, are you look Boudio And it became really
popular and I was like, stuff you mob, I'm the
original Boudio. I'm a lesbian and I'm Larakia I love So.
Speaker 1 (34:13):
That's my tag, that's your Instagram. Yeah easy, Well we've
got to connect and then hopefully how long is the show?
And banks aren't going to go for I was.
Speaker 3 (34:22):
Going into the next year and we've got biggest, more
programs and stuff over summer, so have a look on
that website. We've got like Salvage doing DJing and he's
curating like a whole day's worth of events, which is
his first time doing it.
Speaker 2 (34:33):
So come and support him.
Speaker 1 (34:34):
Yes, I think it's important to support communities. So on
that note, thanks for coming all the way over the
other side of the harbor the city to have a
yarn with me. It's if we don't get many young
deadly black women and I've the queer conversation for young
(34:54):
black fellows that are navigating their identity. That was one
thing I wanted to ask you really quickly. Yeah, I
had Felicia.
Speaker 2 (35:01):
Fox, Yes, Deadly Felicia.
Speaker 1 (35:03):
And that was one of the best performing that rated
and episodes and downloads. One of the best out of
about one hundred and thirty episodes was full and I thought, oh,
can I drop this yarm? I can't censor the yarm
because I'm asking people to just be themselves and feel comfortable.
(35:24):
And next minute, I was thinking, how's the audience, my audien,
It's gonna respond. When I dropped that episode, I was
worried and it was one of the best yarns in
the last four years. So I know that we've got
a lot of people that are probably big supporters of
our mob and also queer mob. Is there any advice?
What would you share with any of our young mob
(35:45):
that trying to navigate their identity.
Speaker 3 (35:48):
Go gently on yourself. I think there's a lot of
expectation about you know, looks and you know who you
should hang out with, what you should wear, what you
should listen to. My wife sits and crowchets every night,
and I have an aqu escaping hobby, but I do
all this deadly stuff.
Speaker 2 (36:05):
I think it's about really understanding.
Speaker 3 (36:07):
Yourself and allowing yourself to go through those chapters of reinvention.
You know, I'm not going to go back to wearing
tied die shirts with a mohawk anytime soon, but I
needed to go through that. It's okay to change and
find the people that support you in that change is
the most important thing, because a lot of people are
going to feel very uncomfortable that you're changing.
Speaker 1 (36:29):
Yeah, I love that. Well, that's a deadly way to
wrap up the yard. Thank you, Thank you so much
for coming and having a Yarm. I'll see it Garma
next year. Oh got we got on the Gama. Yes. Look,
all you mob that have been listening. I hope you've
enjoyed this episode. Until next start by for now. If
you'd like any more on today's guest, please visit our
(36:52):
show notes in the episode description. A big shout out
to all you Deadly Mob and allies who continue to listen, watch,
and support our podcast. Your feedback means the world. You
can rate and review the podcast on Apple and Spotify,
or even head to our socials and YouTube channel and
drop us a line. We'd love to hear from you.
(37:14):
The Black Magic Woman podcast is produced by Clint Curtis
Black Cast, Unite our voices. Black Magic Walman Podcast acknowledges
the traditional owners of the land we have recorded this
episode on. We also acknowledge traditional owners of the land
where you, the listener or viewer are tuning in from.
We would like to pay our respects to our elders
past and present and acknowledged that this always was Aboriginal
(00:26):
land and always will be Aboriginal land.
Speaker 2 (00:29):
That's what I love about art.
Speaker 3 (00:30):
It gives the opportunity to have those discussions and not
being seen as angry or violent or you.
Speaker 2 (00:37):
Know, protesting.
Speaker 3 (00:38):
Is it really protesting when you're protesting your own body
or controversial?
Speaker 1 (00:45):
Welcome to the Black Magic Woman Podcast with Mandanara Bail.
Welcome back to another episode of the Black Magicalman Podcast.
I am here on Cameragle Country, which is in beautiful
Sydney also known as the Orination. I can't wait for
(01:05):
you to meet my next guest, and we've got a
few things that we were to unpack and even made
some connections before we press record. So I can't wait
for you to share a little bit about yourself. Sis
tell our listeners if you don't mine and have views
on YouTube, your name, your mob and a bit about
where you grew up.
Speaker 2 (01:24):
Yeah, hello and thank you for having me.
Speaker 3 (01:26):
My name is Kobe and Edgun and I'm a girl
from Darwin. I grew up in Darwen and moved when
I was about five years old to Adelaide. I've got
biggest mob family and lots of different I guess races,
all the naughty and nice and everything with a bit
of spice. So Filipino, Aboriginal from lat three different language groups, English, Austrian, Irish, Scottish,
(01:50):
a bit of everything.
Speaker 2 (01:52):
That melting pot of Darwin, you.
Speaker 1 (01:53):
Know it is it is. People say that the Darwin's
a melting pot and.
Speaker 2 (01:58):
Here I am.
Speaker 3 (02:00):
Yeah, yeah, big family it Adelade.
Speaker 1 (02:02):
You said you grew up.
Speaker 3 (02:03):
Yeah, when we moved to Adelaide or Tasmania for a year,
weirdly because my stepfather he grew up there and his
grandfather passed away.
Speaker 2 (02:11):
So we stayed there for like a year.
Speaker 3 (02:13):
And then moved to Adelaide and that's where I did
my high school and university studies and then wanted to
come to Sydney because I'm a big Boodoo queer and
wanted to run.
Speaker 1 (02:25):
A mark my family down here too. Do you know
Caira comes sing.
Speaker 3 (02:32):
I do know Caira. Yeah, she works up in Marley there. Yeah,
she's Brenda's niece, Brenda Croft's niece. Yeah, I know her
from around the track. She does deadly work over there.
She's clear too, one of our biggest mob queer todays
around here.
Speaker 1 (02:46):
Well, I marched to Marti Grass with her, that's deadily first.
It was actually a dream of mine to get on
that parade, but I just didn't want to be on
anyone's float. So I was on the float that actually
won for the best float, which one was.
Speaker 2 (03:02):
It was the memorial real float Okay, yeah, for a.
Speaker 1 (03:05):
Brother boy who passed away. Yes, I was on that one.
Speaker 2 (03:08):
Yeah, and my.
Speaker 1 (03:09):
Brother Greg Phillips was a queen on the front of it.
But my yeah, my lot of my family and community here.
I grew up partying in Oxford Street.
Speaker 2 (03:21):
I didn't get that, like they closed that down before
I could.
Speaker 1 (03:24):
Well, I was here then and it was the best.
Speaker 2 (03:26):
That's why I came.
Speaker 3 (03:27):
Because my uncle was just like you know, Uncle Gary Lee,
his beautiful uncle, great great artist as well. And he yeah,
when I was younger, he was I was had like
mohawk and wearing like butch clothes. And stuff, and he's like,
but I know you're not real feminine. But I know
you're not real butch either. So gave me Tiffany jewelry
and he's like you can be a bit of.
Speaker 2 (03:49):
A mix of both, you know. And I'm like, thanks uncle,
and he's like, you need to go to Sydney. I
grew up in Sydney.
Speaker 1 (03:55):
And go run on. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (03:58):
And then I was like, all right, oh, come Sydney,
lock out laws, no party.
Speaker 1 (04:02):
Terrible in Covid. I know.
Speaker 2 (04:05):
So woman, I'm married. Oh good, I did it. You
did it, you did it.
Speaker 1 (04:10):
Need the night live.
Speaker 3 (04:11):
No, I came to the Big Pond. I found myself
a fish and yes, you're not related. No, No, she's white.
Speaker 1 (04:19):
Because of the bloody stolen generation. Right, but we're here today,
and I know that you're doing a lot of work
in so many different spaces. Yeah, and you're representing out
there in Bankstown all over the shop, but living here
in Redfern.
Speaker 2 (04:37):
Yeah, living in Redfern. I've lived all over.
Speaker 3 (04:39):
When I moved to Sydney, I was working at the
Art Gallery of New South Wales. I was working for
Tracy Moffin. Actually she was doing the Venice Bionali and
I was one of her assistants. So I moved over
and then started working for the art gallery there for
like eight years. And during that time, when you land
in Sydney you just end up, you know, hop scotching
around the city. It's really hard to find your roots.
(05:01):
So I lived in Red fan fresh Water, over this
side and then all over you know, Australia Street in
Marrickville there with all the queers and all the lovelies there.
Speaker 2 (05:12):
My local pub was super queer. I loved it.
Speaker 3 (05:15):
Just a hop, skip and jump away from my house.
I could walk home at two o'clock in the morning
and be right yeah and have biggest mob.
Speaker 2 (05:22):
Fun with everyone. And then now I'm back in Redfern.
Speaker 3 (05:25):
I lived in Red Fernd with my one of my
sister girls, Nicole Monks, and she's an artist. She had
a little boy, little boy, Bitty Bitdy, at five years old,
and she's like, well, if you can deal with a kid,
you can come live with me.
Speaker 2 (05:37):
And I'm like, yeah, I'm right with kids.
Speaker 1 (05:38):
I got a lot of mob.
Speaker 2 (05:39):
Yeah, I'm right.
Speaker 3 (05:40):
She's like, in Sydney, most people don't want to live
with five year old kids and I'm like, oh, I
don't give.
Speaker 2 (05:43):
A start, Like I don't care.
Speaker 1 (05:46):
Serious side.
Speaker 2 (05:47):
I moved in and first thing I cooked for her.
Speaker 1 (05:49):
Now you're auntie.
Speaker 3 (05:50):
Yeah, chili mudcrab first meal. And now that kid loves
his seafood, he's full. I'm getting him, like Darwin Palette.
Speaker 1 (05:58):
Yeah, making sure because there's that kind of Malaysian Indonesian.
There's even Chinese japan influence.
Speaker 2 (06:04):
Yeah we're Asian.
Speaker 3 (06:06):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (06:06):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (06:07):
We traded with Silhouesi for two hundred years prior to colonization.
You know tripang ce cucumber that went all the way
up to China and back.
Speaker 2 (06:14):
And people don't talk about that.
Speaker 3 (06:16):
Because that is a really amazing piece of evidence of
us being, you know, a very well developed economy. We
had training, having international relations, We had international relations for
two hundred years prior to colonization. The mccasson move will
come over six months of the year and set up camp.
Our word for money is rupia, our word for suscils,
(06:37):
breast for milk, a word for milks.
Speaker 1 (06:42):
So their language became part of our local dialects and languages.
Speaker 3 (06:48):
And culture to like, you know, they traded still with us,
you know, steel all the there's like heaps, big history
of steel cloth, tobacco, you know, marriage as well. You
know they went over there and married up and had
family and were buried there and biggest story there.
Speaker 1 (07:07):
But there was a actual what do you call it
when there's a reunion. There was something in the early
nineties where the Darwin government flew over Indonesian people, about
six of them who were descendants of abersh On people, to.
Speaker 3 (07:25):
Honor that trade. Ye, yeah, that relationship. Yeah, we still
do it. Like I went to Gama two years ago
now and that Yeah, we had brother Abdi there. Abdi's
an artist and he came over and you know, did
that ceremony with the I think it was a good
much mob that he did it with.
Speaker 2 (07:42):
I can't remember, but you know that ceremony.
Speaker 3 (07:45):
So they you know, he did his dance and then
they had their reply and re enacted that meeting on
the beach that they'd usually have at the start of
a season.
Speaker 1 (07:53):
Did we watch that plant? We were there that year,
So we've been a garment at the same time.
Speaker 2 (07:58):
We've probably been walking down the street. You have not
even seen each other.
Speaker 1 (08:01):
Because Marrickville is like death but like the place to be.
Speaker 3 (08:05):
Yeah, I'm quiet person unless someone puts the camera in
front of my face and change.
Speaker 1 (08:09):
And the next minute, next minute. Yeah, so what are
you doing now?
Speaker 2 (08:13):
Like you're curating still, So I'm a curated by trade.
Speaker 3 (08:16):
So I finished high school and I was the first
person from my family to finish high school. Immediate family,
real geek like Choristar school captain type geek, proper geeks. Yeah, yeah,
high achiever, Yeah, I don't know b's and you know,
a couple of a's and caesar, but not hugely high
(08:36):
achiever in comparison to the rest of the world.
Speaker 1 (08:38):
But but what still and in a leadership position? Why
are you at school?
Speaker 2 (08:43):
I was in the you know, in the ring.
Speaker 3 (08:45):
I want to go so yeah, and then yeah, my
art teacher was like, you should probably do an arts
degree because I was like, I don't know what I
want to do. I like sports or my brothers and
art do sports my art, but you know, you can't
really make money from art. Maybe I'll be a teacher.
I've got a scholarship to do a teaching did one
(09:05):
term of it and was like, I can't do this.
If this woman tells me that I have to do
X Y and Z to teach a class. Like there's
so many different ways to teach something. It's just like
you can't do this, this and this, and I'm like
I can.
Speaker 1 (09:17):
I don't want to doubt that non completely different approach.
Speaker 3 (09:21):
Yeah, so I worked to Adelaide High School for ages
when I was a kid or kid eighteen nineteen, twenty
twenty one, and then yeah, it.
Speaker 2 (09:28):
Was like I'll just try curating.
Speaker 3 (09:29):
Like it's this big, kind of scary looking thing when
you look at curators and what they do, but Adelaide
was a good place to do it. I did Time
and Do Festival, which was the inaugural festival with Nicki
Compston there. I was twenty four. That was a huge
amount of experience for me. You know, I just roughed
it like most art curators for the first few years,
you know, six different jobs and in one calendar year
(09:52):
and having to apply for grants and just exhausted all
the time.
Speaker 2 (09:56):
But nothing changes.
Speaker 1 (09:58):
So there's no money as a curator, Like tell me,
it's like.
Speaker 3 (10:02):
All arts practices, like there's no money until you're the
top like ten percent, and everyone wants to wear something
that you've made or be in a room that you've curated.
Speaker 1 (10:10):
I can't. I didn't realize it. I know it's quite
I know the arts in Genue that a lot of
our mob in particular like Struggle.
Speaker 3 (10:21):
I'm basically ADMIN last, so it's like yeah, same same,
different as Admin.
Speaker 1 (10:26):
Yeah. So you're here in Sydney you're curating. Yeah, yeah,
what are you working on now? Anything that yeh can hear?
Speaker 2 (10:34):
There's so much we see.
Speaker 3 (10:36):
There's like the National Portrait Gallery down in Canberra. I've
just there's a show up at the moment with Joan
Ross and that's my first show working with a non
Indigenous person. Actually, she's Glaswegian and really really fun. She's
just a really good friend of mine, and she confronts
the colonial colonial agreed, the superiority superiority complexes that came
(10:56):
on the shores with those big boats, and how we've
ended up where we are today because of all of that.
And she's really good fun. I like working on with
different people. And you know, we've got that big Captain
cook that's like worth several million dollars hanging up next
to one that she's made out of krusty.
Speaker 1 (11:12):
Carpet at the National Gallery.
Speaker 2 (11:15):
National Portrait Gallery, National Portrait gallery.
Speaker 1 (11:18):
Is this where there was also a Gina Ryan Hank piece.
Speaker 2 (11:21):
Oh no, that's across the road, but yeah, from it.
Speaker 1 (11:24):
And she was demanding that they remove it. Yeah, and
they were like, but this is.
Speaker 2 (11:28):
Our it is Yeah, you can't. Sorry it did it?
Speaker 1 (11:31):
It went all around the world, didn't it. And now
more people have seen it. No one would have even
known that it was there. Nah.
Speaker 2 (11:37):
And she didn't kick up stick and he does portreous
like that. That's what it gave the.
Speaker 1 (11:40):
Artist, this kind of global spotlight and recognition.
Speaker 2 (11:44):
I was like, yeah, Vincent's really lovely.
Speaker 3 (11:47):
He's quite shy sometimes, but when he speaks he can
be very you know.
Speaker 2 (11:51):
His work's very serious as well. I've bumped into him
a fair bit.
Speaker 1 (11:56):
Through his grandson, your great grandson, grandson, great grandson, great
grandson for Albert Namage. Oh yeah, wow, you've met him.
Speaker 2 (12:06):
I've worked with talk about him.
Speaker 1 (12:08):
We do art tours. We need to connect.
Speaker 2 (12:11):
Yeah, that's been my career. Curators. That's what we do.
Speaker 3 (12:13):
We do art tours and explain art and write lots
of stuff and do heaps of research. I basically make
a beautiful space for people to tell their stories and
try to be the translator between their world and the
rest of the world.
Speaker 1 (12:27):
And the institutions all of it at the same time. Yeah,
you got to know how to navigate all of that. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (12:33):
So ten years working in institutions. Started at the Art
Gallery of South Australia, moved over to Art Gallery of
New South Wales and then Powerhouse. And I quit working
for institutions when the referendum happened and I just didn't
like the way that the world was, the politics were
treating our lives.
Speaker 2 (12:49):
And you know, yet again just who was showing up
for us?
Speaker 3 (12:53):
Yeah, And I was like, I can't keep working for
government if government doesn't work for me. And I've learned
the playbook. I know what you're about. I respect you,
but you can't have any more of my time.
Speaker 2 (13:05):
Sorry.
Speaker 1 (13:05):
My mum said you what do you keep your friends
close but your enemy is closer. But she also said
to go and learn the white men's ways.
Speaker 2 (13:16):
Well that's why I was there, and learn.
Speaker 1 (13:18):
And then come back and bring those skills or experiences
back to committityes. So the Powerhouse is was that more independent.
Speaker 3 (13:26):
The little brother, little brother of Art Gallery of New
South Wales. So back in the day, all right here
we go you want to hear about histories.
Speaker 2 (13:32):
Now.
Speaker 3 (13:34):
The first kind of ever gallery or space that held
objects in Sydney was in the Botanic Gardens and Jonathan
Jones made a really amazing work for the Cawdor Public
Art Projects, bar Angle Jara and it was about these
this building and this building had all of these artifacts
from Polynesia, Melanesia, huge building. It was during the time
when they first figured out how to make electricity.
Speaker 2 (13:54):
It fire, biggest fire. Everything went up only ash. That's it.
Speaker 3 (14:01):
It was that hot that fire and all of these
cultural artifacts died. And from there they set up the
Art Gallery Society, which became the Art Gallery of New
South Wales, which was the whole heap of you know,
people who were really keen on the arts and wanted
to collect art and wanted Sydney to be a hub
for art and be the place to be in Australia
for art. And then the Powerhouse Museum was established as
(14:23):
it's like brother and that's more about the activity of doing,
and you know they look more at processes of things,
so you know, one of their first big projects was
the Castle Hill site of eucalyp plantations and those eucalyid plantations.
They tested all the different eucalypt types to see, Okay,
which one's best for oils, which one's best for tannins,
which one's best for making houses with all of that
(14:45):
kind of scientific stuff, And the Powerhouse holds that knowledge,
and then the art gallery holds like, like I guess,
high art and expression of art in that context.
Speaker 1 (14:55):
Yeah, you see a lot of shows that were at
the Powerhouse, like it's a creative space.
Speaker 3 (15:00):
Yeah, it's about showing that process as well as the product,
which is why.
Speaker 1 (15:05):
Yeah, because there's like the Prisbone Powerhouse, Sydney Powerhouse, and
they all kind of connected to the galleries.
Speaker 2 (15:13):
No, not always.
Speaker 3 (15:15):
Those guys are just like they kind of established via
state or territory, and they're not always. They're all independent
from from themselves and kind of had different ways of establishing.
But a lot of the time it was to create
places for Australian art and to be housed.
Speaker 2 (15:33):
And the importance of that.
Speaker 3 (15:35):
Obviously goes back to the collecting and collecting institutions and
why do we collect who decided to collect things? It
wasn't you know, within indigenous culture, we most of our
objects are ephemeral for a reason.
Speaker 2 (15:48):
You know, they're meant to die after time.
Speaker 3 (15:50):
Whereas this kind of where did the collecting methodologies come from?
Their scientific methodologies of collecting, you know, and then now
we have these beautiful art galleries and museums. But the
hard of it is we first started to collect scientific things,
including people's bodies.
Speaker 2 (16:08):
Yes, and cultural artifiling heads.
Speaker 3 (16:11):
And that was a part of the colonial process. I
own this object now, and that it's a part of
my collection. This thing that where you think you own
it because you've got a sample of it, and that
idea of ownership, and that's a psychological thing. You know,
Black fellows might have a piece of land, but I
don't feel like you own it.
Speaker 1 (16:28):
It's like a paper. Yeah, I do you own a property.
You own the piece of paper, not the actual land.
Speaker 3 (16:35):
And what was colonization like it was you know, these
beautiful words written on a piece of paper that people
that spoken understood that language said all right, yeah, well
that makes sense to me, or right it must be true. Yeah,
move on, let's not ask the person that's actually you know,
the person being subjected to this thought or idea.
Speaker 1 (16:53):
And this is the beauty of art, right, that representation
still retelling you know, keeping history alive and keeping people accountable.
And I think that's an issue. It isn't is, Sue.
I don't think in this country where there's a massive
denial of our history, our shared history.
Speaker 2 (17:11):
I think that.
Speaker 1 (17:14):
You must get so much.
Speaker 2 (17:16):
It's an intellectual field. So like it.
Speaker 3 (17:18):
It's seemed different like so, I think R and B
is an intellectual field, but it's not necessarily appreciated as
such by you know, the white canon of what is
important to their lives and knowledge and systems and blah
blah blah. But art is art is something that we
can kind of meet them intellectually on a level. And
it's a really good football field for us to get
(17:40):
a few good tackles in because we can re evidence
what they've written in their books and put in their
museums and say, hey, hold on a second, right here,
you wrote that in your own words, and I've just
made an artwork about it. It's not political, it's just
the truth telling. So that's what I love about art.
It gives that opportunity to have those those discussions and
(18:01):
not being seen and angry or violent or you.
Speaker 2 (18:06):
Know, protesting.
Speaker 3 (18:07):
Is it really protest when you're protesting your own body
or controversial, it's not. So that's why I went into
the arts because and Richard Bell has this really great
quote he's amazing political artist.
Speaker 2 (18:18):
My uncle get out. Well then fuck you would know that.
Speaker 3 (18:21):
I do know.
Speaker 1 (18:22):
He's like all of his art.
Speaker 2 (18:23):
Why did he become an artist? Because he wouldn't get
arrested for saying what he wanted to say?
Speaker 1 (18:28):
Yeah, like he would have he has he become.
Speaker 2 (18:31):
He's like everyone loves him. He's like ooriginal arts uncle.
He's not just your uncle. We think he's all our uncle.
Speaker 1 (18:38):
He's like, yeah, we love He's kind of led the way.
One of many people that have been part of a
So he's part of Proper Now collective and they're in
Brisbane and there's a whole of deadly people.
Speaker 2 (18:49):
Marley's kind of like the Sydney version of.
Speaker 1 (18:51):
The sum version of Proper Now that it's I don't
know why though, like still in twenty twenty four that
people like uncle Richard seen is Oh that's a bit
provocative or that's a bit radical. It's truth telling and
that's the issue in this country. People don't don't feel
comfortable with some of the truths.
Speaker 3 (19:11):
Yeah, well, I guess that's what happens when you're not
used to I don't know, looking at your own privilege
and understanding why that might make you feel uncomfortable. Because
if you're uncomfortable from what he says, then maybe it's
because you should.
Speaker 1 (19:27):
Be self working. Yeah, and am soulf searching.
Speaker 3 (19:37):
That might need to happen, And it doesn't come from
anywhere either, Like even his bells serum is still popular today,
you know, you know Aboriginal LANs, A white thing is
what it says.
Speaker 2 (19:45):
And he's not wrong in a lot of senses.
Speaker 3 (19:47):
You know, arnam lend Mob they change their barks from
just being racked to putting in pictures of the animals
so that Blunders could try and figure it out easier.
So you know, he altered, they altered those specific paintings
to make it easier for Blunder Mob, not for their
own people.
Speaker 2 (20:06):
So it was the white thing to do that.
Speaker 3 (20:08):
And introduce those things to try and make it easier
for non indigenous people to understand us. Same with Uncle
Vincent then Albert Namajeera, his uncle, grandfather, great great grandfather,
he painted watercolors in that vein so that it could
be appreciated for like picturesque.
Speaker 2 (20:29):
He could paint dot paintings.
Speaker 3 (20:31):
He chose not to for a reason because it's easier
for people to see, Oh yeah, that's that range there,
that Mount Gillen Rangers, if you're a blunder, because you've
seen it with your eyes, than it is for you
to see it in their symbolic representations, which is dot paintings.
Speaker 1 (20:47):
And that's when we talk about abation art. It's it's versatile.
People have adapted, it's evolved. It's not just traditionally dot
painting anymore. So you see a lot of art these days,
like Honey Judy Watson like it is work. Yeah, she's
big bronze sculptures. You've got Megan Cope over on you
(21:09):
know Juba doing oysters and stuff. You've got weavers doing
all different art in the work that you're doing. Now.
I guess is there a massive art show happening?
Speaker 3 (21:23):
Is it?
Speaker 2 (21:24):
Yeah?
Speaker 3 (21:25):
Well on Saturday, we've got that same, same different show
at black Blacktown Arts Center, which is a Binali Blacktown
b and Aali actually and that's a it's not huge show,
but it's a it's it's more of a local community.
Speaker 2 (21:38):
It's a local community like art center.
Speaker 1 (21:41):
It's quite like there's a lot of people that are
engaged with it in the community.
Speaker 2 (21:45):
Yeah, yeah, that's why I want to see them.
Speaker 1 (21:47):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (21:47):
So usually most of my work I've done either like
you know, training people in desert, you know, how to
hang a painting, or you know, I like being at
bush most of the time. I'm not a curator who
likes to be you know over in New York, preferred
to be in your color.
Speaker 2 (22:05):
Thank you.
Speaker 3 (22:06):
And so when I work in institutions, a lot of
my work is focused in in cities and in big
buildings that are you know, made out of beautiful marble
that I'm scared I'll slip on.
Speaker 2 (22:18):
And so it's nice to go into the communities.
Speaker 3 (22:20):
And I've lived in Sydney for nearly eight years now
and I haven't had the opportunity to work with the
local arts center. I did a show out the Bearded Tit,
my favorite gay little pub courts to stop sucking.
Speaker 2 (22:33):
The black tit what it's called, That's.
Speaker 3 (22:35):
What it was called, Yeah, about how you know, people
need to get off the black tit and maybe you know,
start trying to find their own resources and shit.
Speaker 1 (22:46):
So some of these shows, right, that's taking a piss,
but it's humor.
Speaker 2 (22:50):
You need a bit of humor with all the trauma.
Speaker 3 (22:53):
And that's kind of what I've been doing a lot
with my work, is focusing on joy, like I can.
You know, I've studied art for long enough to know
I can be real serious and give a two hour
presentation on the steer of an artist. But that doesn't
move me, and I don't think it moves many people anymore.
I think we need a little bit of humor and
same same with different and different.
Speaker 1 (23:12):
You know.
Speaker 3 (23:12):
I was brought on by Rachel Kang there, she's the director.
She had a bit of an idea about what she
wanted to focus on and look at ways that different
people connect and people connect with nature in different cultures.
And I was like, I was sitting in Darwin with
my uncle Gary, and I was like, it's all just same, same, different.
(23:32):
But I was like, okay, yeah, that's the title of
the show. Uncle then and he's like well, I was like, uncle,
what do you mean by that? And he's like, well,
you know black follows that were colonized here, we eat rice.
Black follows on that side, they eat potatoes, same, same, different,
we all have these different ways of connecting with each other.
It's our ways of being doing a noyse if you
(23:53):
want to get into like axiologies, you know, ontologies, the
scientific ways of looking at it and pistemologies jumping into that.
Speaker 1 (24:02):
I reckon on Colin, that's cancer.
Speaker 2 (24:06):
On colleges.
Speaker 3 (24:07):
These big words they are, they're big words, but it's
just it's just the same, same, different Like I love.
Speaker 1 (24:13):
That the fact you're saying, you know, I can talk
this talk, go and present on this for two hours
and give a highly intellect your account of somebody's life,
or just go out bush and just be with mob.
Speaker 2 (24:25):
I'd just rather be with mob.
Speaker 3 (24:27):
Yeah, it's that's the where I get my joy from.
And so same, same different kind of looks at that
I want people to talk about. You know, I was
talking about the Siluesian our Indonesian.
Speaker 2 (24:40):
We're very Asian in Darwin.
Speaker 1 (24:41):
You know.
Speaker 3 (24:42):
The only reason I reckon that we're called like you know,
Australia is because of the colony.
Speaker 2 (24:46):
We actually are very Asian.
Speaker 1 (24:48):
We are in the Asian neighborhood.
Speaker 3 (24:50):
Yeah, we're closer to their mob over there than we
are to you know, people down in Tasmania. Yeah, so
we have that Asian culture and people forget about it.
And I'm like, you know all the way that people
migrate here and start families, especially people of color, same, same,
different a lot of the time, you know, getting away
from war, getting away from poverty, trying to start a
(25:11):
better life, whatever it is. And they have similarities within that. Also,
the way that we we pray, the way that we
religiously do things, you know, religious religion is you know,
the repetitive movements of something, you know, with intention, and
you know the way that we cook food together, the
way we prepare food. There's similarities. Blood chung is. We
(25:33):
could talk about blood chung for three hours, and you know,
just as a food. And how many different families have
different ingredients that they.
Speaker 2 (25:41):
Salty plums, yeah, saldi plums.
Speaker 1 (25:44):
Everyone eats soldi plums most people in Yeah. I love
soldy plums.
Speaker 2 (25:48):
That was our lollies.
Speaker 1 (25:49):
My husbands Fijian, he loves salty plums.
Speaker 2 (25:52):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (25:53):
I was like, what the heck? Olia, the lemon with vinegar,
some salt, nah, but not salty plums.
Speaker 2 (26:02):
No, salti plums are grow up on them.
Speaker 1 (26:04):
Just had miss Staple and your teeth for red.
Speaker 3 (26:07):
Teeth a red all the time, Yes, stains on your hands,
the day's taste.
Speaker 2 (26:12):
Yeah, used to they were our lollies. You know, we
didn't have like you know.
Speaker 1 (26:16):
They're an Asian.
Speaker 2 (26:17):
Yeah, they're dried plums, dried plums. They're dried preserved.
Speaker 3 (26:20):
Plums with heaps of salt on them so they're super
sour and put them in your mouth and mango dried mango.
Speaker 1 (26:26):
Pray for salty plums, I know, Yeah, I pray for
salti plums.
Speaker 2 (26:29):
I've got salty plums. They're just sitting in there when
I miss home.
Speaker 1 (26:32):
Yeah, here in Sydney, there is a community here and
you're mentioning like it's rewarding and you get joy from
being with MOB. Do you ever get to go back home.
Speaker 2 (26:43):
All the time?
Speaker 1 (26:44):
Yeah?
Speaker 3 (26:44):
I do because I work in the arts and well
and Tea's kind of a hub for you know, to
to scatter from there if you want to go to
art centers.
Speaker 2 (26:55):
So I go home a.
Speaker 3 (26:55):
Lot because if I want to work with MOB, I
try to go out there and make sure that my
projects I'm going out there. I don't like being a
cue reader who just sits there and is like I
want five of those beautiful bags from that community by
this date, thank you very much. Like I need to
go there and with that relationships and.
Speaker 1 (27:15):
Is there advice then for our mom who might want
to work in this space.
Speaker 3 (27:21):
What if there's so much work there? Honestly, there's so
much work, Come and join me. Honestly, I love it.
It's good fun. There's different ways that you can curate. Like,
I'm not a very serious curator. I like to have
fun with my work. I have a joke, you know,
I do some writing, I'm on stage sometimes you can.
Speaker 2 (27:37):
There's lots of different things you can do. I'm sitting
here talking to you.
Speaker 3 (27:40):
You know.
Speaker 2 (27:40):
I thought i'd be a book bitch, but I'm.
Speaker 1 (27:42):
Not self in point your own boss.
Speaker 2 (27:44):
Yeah, I'm independent.
Speaker 1 (27:45):
Independent.
Speaker 3 (27:46):
I work part time for Agency Projects, which is just
made a move to advertise for its first CEO indeed CEO.
So please, if you know anyone who's deadly that wants
to come work with me and Leila and Mately and
the team, we're looking for a deadly indigenous CEO really
in Melbourne National Remit. I work part time for them,
(28:07):
and then the rest of the time I do things
like this. Yeah, Bankstown working with Joan Writing. I do
lots of writing. I love writing.
Speaker 1 (28:15):
And what do you do with the writing?
Speaker 2 (28:16):
I write about artists?
Speaker 3 (28:18):
Yeah, I write essays for artists, write diaristically as well
about people like you. Today you're like, I'm not going
to read your bio. You can introduce yourself. Yeah, the credentials,
that's a big part of like being advertising yourself, I
think as a person nowadays, and I don't think it
comes well for black fellows at all.
Speaker 2 (28:36):
Yeah, I don't do it. I've refuse to do it.
Speaker 3 (28:38):
You know, some will sit there and to you and
be like I did this and I did that, and
like you can google me if you really want to,
but maybe just get to know me as a person
and if you like me, then work with me.
Speaker 1 (28:47):
Well that's the thing, right, relationships.
Speaker 2 (28:49):
Yeah, and I prefer those things.
Speaker 3 (28:51):
And you know, just the kind of credentials freaks me
out a little bit, so I try it away.
Speaker 1 (28:57):
It's a kind of waderline where you're big noting it is.
I know, when you're growing up in community, you kind
of I don't know, there's something about our culture where
there's this kind of humbleness about it.
Speaker 3 (29:07):
You can't pretend like you're better than the person that
sits next to you, even if they otherwise.
Speaker 1 (29:11):
People said, we're supposed to come from.
Speaker 3 (29:12):
Yeah, it's no, that's not how we work for you.
So it's like, yeah, a bit weird trying to do curating.
But the curating is good fun. You get really good opportunities,
Like I've traveled so much. I've gotten to see so
many different parts of the world, had so many amazing opportunities.
Speaker 1 (29:27):
Favorite country. Is there a favorite country? It has to
be had outside of this butiful place.
Speaker 2 (29:34):
No, honestly, I just got I get home.
Speaker 1 (29:37):
Nowhere else in the world you could go. That was
like reminding me of home. Now.
Speaker 3 (29:43):
I liked Singapore because people looked like me, and I
like their food, like they have amazing food. I could
just live there and eat all day every day. Yeah,
that was good fun.
Speaker 1 (29:52):
My kids are looking for the next holiday.
Speaker 2 (29:54):
Oh is that what you ask?
Speaker 1 (29:55):
So they're asking. One wants to go to Singapore, one
wants to go to Thailand, and the other one wants
to go to Japan.
Speaker 2 (30:01):
So I've been to Japan.
Speaker 1 (30:02):
Japan.
Speaker 2 (30:02):
It's good too.
Speaker 3 (30:03):
Yes, that's real deadly, Yes, that's freak out though, Like
it's not for like, you know, going into nature or anything. Yeah,
you want to go to all the big mulls and
stuff and eat all the fruit.
Speaker 1 (30:13):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (30:14):
And then Singapore a bit same, but they've got like
it's freaky city because it's real multicultural. It's kind of
like you know how Venice was like a you know,
a port for people to come in and out of.
Speaker 2 (30:23):
It's a bit like that, and but heaps of Asian mob.
Speaker 3 (30:26):
So it's like, I don't know, I've traveled overseas to
plenty of places, but I'm like racially ambiguous, like people
can't pick me like from and so it's like being
around places where I can blend.
Speaker 2 (30:40):
In weirdly, like yeah, another radar. Sometimes we went to
Belgium with my wife a couple of weeks ago, and
I did not like it at all.
Speaker 1 (30:47):
It was just different.
Speaker 2 (30:48):
Liken, Like I just didn't enjoy it.
Speaker 3 (30:50):
I'm like, you can't no birds, no trees, like no
one had dogs walking down the street.
Speaker 2 (30:55):
I don't know, just weird. Just everything was brick and beer.
It's like and I'm like that's good, Like you've got
beautiful culture here.
Speaker 1 (31:02):
That's part of that's the that's what they do.
Speaker 3 (31:04):
I don't want a street market, not a pub. I
don't know, so yeah, that's what I like. I guess preference,
personal preference.
Speaker 1 (31:11):
I just I know that a lot of listeners are
going to be like blown away that you've makes people
just kind of don't think blackfellows can do what you do,
can do what I do, travel to twenty different countries,
you know, like there's so limited. A lot of people
are very limited. They're thinking of what we can do
(31:31):
and achieve, and it's sounded one thing, but at the
same time doesn't bother me.
Speaker 3 (31:35):
I'm just fluking at this, Like honestly, I've been fluking
it since day one, and.
Speaker 2 (31:39):
I don't keep going.
Speaker 1 (31:40):
I don't have that plan.
Speaker 2 (31:41):
I just do what I love to do.
Speaker 3 (31:42):
I try and challenge myself, and you know, if someone
says that I'm stupid, I try and prove them wrong,
which is probably why I ended up very successful academically,
you know. But now I'm in my thirties and I'm
moving out of that and I'm comfortable. You know, I've
proven to myself that I can get these really good
(32:02):
jobs and go and do all these really deadly things.
And now I just want to work with mob again
and young people again and be like, it's hard work,
but it's fulfilling work, and there's heaps of jobs out
there in the arts. It's a really good space for
you to work on yourself and your community as well,
because you have to. When you're working in arts, you're
(32:22):
not doing a skilled job for hire. You're talking about
something that belongs to you, your identity, and you belong
to that community as well. So it can also be
really fulfilling moralistically for yourself.
Speaker 1 (32:35):
Getting people to reconnect if they're not connected to community.
That's probably a good way to wrap up the art
because a lot of our mob, especially that come to
the big cities, a lot of them don't come with
much family or something and they've got to start from scratch.
So I hope that some of the people that are
listening are inspired about what you've been doing and all
(32:56):
the things you've achieved. And you're only in your thirties.
I'm like far but I don't get to many people
here that are in Sydney that are doing the things
that you've done. And I think listeners are probably thinking, wow,
where have you been? How do we connect? So do
you have a website? How do people reach out to
you on your socials?
Speaker 2 (33:15):
Yeah, you can jump on my Instagram.
Speaker 3 (33:17):
It's bou which means some associ in Lalarakia language or
old people it means something else.
Speaker 1 (33:24):
Yeah, how do you spell it?
Speaker 2 (33:26):
B d ju?
Speaker 1 (33:29):
Would you?
Speaker 2 (33:30):
Yeah?
Speaker 1 (33:31):
You know you know what budgiegen is.
Speaker 2 (33:34):
Yeah, yeah, it's all purpose. When you went in.
Speaker 1 (33:40):
Brisbane right when you're Bourdill your ship, yeah, damn it.
So where people going, hey are you Budell? When I
was like under the Murray School leaving Redford, I'm like,
am I bud What do you mean? Am I bouder?
Speaker 2 (33:51):
So there was this is going to make you laugh?
Speaker 3 (33:53):
So means vagina in Larakia from old ways, yes, and
then it was appropriated by heaps of black queer mob
to mean sexy. So lots of like queer black men
are like, are you look Boudio And it became really
popular and I was like, stuff you mob, I'm the
original Boudio. I'm a lesbian and I'm Larakia I love So.
Speaker 1 (34:13):
That's my tag, that's your Instagram. Yeah easy, Well we've
got to connect and then hopefully how long is the show?
And banks aren't going to go for I was.
Speaker 3 (34:22):
Going into the next year and we've got biggest, more
programs and stuff over summer, so have a look on
that website. We've got like Salvage doing DJing and he's
curating like a whole day's worth of events, which is
his first time doing it.
Speaker 2 (34:33):
So come and support him.
Speaker 1 (34:34):
Yes, I think it's important to support communities. So on
that note, thanks for coming all the way over the
other side of the harbor the city to have a
yarn with me. It's if we don't get many young
deadly black women and I've the queer conversation for young
(34:54):
black fellows that are navigating their identity. That was one
thing I wanted to ask you really quickly. Yeah, I
had Felicia.
Speaker 2 (35:01):
Fox, Yes, Deadly Felicia.
Speaker 1 (35:03):
And that was one of the best performing that rated
and episodes and downloads. One of the best out of
about one hundred and thirty episodes was full and I thought, oh,
can I drop this yarm? I can't censor the yarm
because I'm asking people to just be themselves and feel comfortable.
(35:24):
And next minute, I was thinking, how's the audience, my audien,
It's gonna respond. When I dropped that episode, I was
worried and it was one of the best yarns in
the last four years. So I know that we've got
a lot of people that are probably big supporters of
our mob and also queer mob. Is there any advice?
What would you share with any of our young mob
(35:45):
that trying to navigate their identity.
Speaker 3 (35:48):
Go gently on yourself. I think there's a lot of
expectation about you know, looks and you know who you
should hang out with, what you should wear, what you
should listen to. My wife sits and crowchets every night,
and I have an aqu escaping hobby, but I do
all this deadly stuff.
Speaker 2 (36:05):
I think it's about really understanding.
Speaker 3 (36:07):
Yourself and allowing yourself to go through those chapters of reinvention.
You know, I'm not going to go back to wearing
tied die shirts with a mohawk anytime soon, but I
needed to go through that. It's okay to change and
find the people that support you in that change is
the most important thing, because a lot of people are
going to feel very uncomfortable that you're changing.
Speaker 1 (36:29):
Yeah, I love that. Well, that's a deadly way to
wrap up the yard. Thank you, Thank you so much
for coming and having a Yarm. I'll see it Garma
next year. Oh got we got on the Gama. Yes. Look,
all you mob that have been listening. I hope you've
enjoyed this episode. Until next start by for now. If
you'd like any more on today's guest, please visit our
(36:52):
show notes in the episode description. A big shout out
to all you Deadly Mob and allies who continue to listen, watch,
and support our podcast. Your feedback means the world. You
can rate and review the podcast on Apple and Spotify,
or even head to our socials and YouTube channel and
drop us a line. We'd love to hear from you.
(37:14):
The Black Magic Woman podcast is produced by Clint Curtis
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