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| Lennard Walker's "Kulyuru" (2021) / Courtesy of the artist and Spinifex Arts Project |
By Park Han-sol
"By instructing students how to learn, unlearn and relearn, a powerful new dimension can be added to education," wrote American author and futurist Alvin Toffler in his 1970 book, "Future Shock." "Tomorrow's illiterate will not be the man who can't read; he will be the man who has not learned how to learn."
Here, "unlearning" isn't about simply erasing one's previous knowledge. Rather, it points to a way of challenging and dismantling embedded beliefs, assumptions and values ― leaving room for "relearning" new, critical ideas.
The new exhibition, co-curated by the Seoul Museum of Art (SeMA) and Artspace Sydney, becomes a platform for this cycle of learning, specifically about the cultural landscape of Australia.
"Un/Learning Australia" invites 35 of the country's contemporary artists and artist collectives, including Aboriginal creators, to unlearn the previous way of reading Australia as one grand, singular cultural narrative, and relearn it as a site of the multiple layers of voices and histories.
The featured artists "come from the most vast and diverse context of Australia," said Alexie Glass-Kantor, the executive director of Artspace, during a recent press preview held at the SeMA.
"They represent generations of artists in their 20s, through artists who have passed away in the past two years. They work in a diversity of media," including videos, tapestries, barkcloth art and paintings.
Among some 60 works on display, the pieces produced by the Indigenous artists are particularly shed in a new light, as the museum goes beyond labelling them ― rather stereotypically ― as "spiritual art" or "handicrafts." Instead, they are viewed as a historical testament to the changing understanding of the Aboriginal people in mainstream Australian society and its art scene.
Lennard Walker's mesmerizing paintings of "Kulyuru," two of which stand at the entrance of the exhibition like gatekeepers, depict a gigantic, deep rockhole featured in the Seven Sisters Tjukurpa, an Aboriginal creation story. The story has remained of great significance in the Tjukaltjara region of Spinifex country, where the artist was born and raised, also known as part of the state of Western Australia.
In 1998, Walker participated in the creation of the first landscape painting that became evidence for his Spinifex people to claim legal ownership of their land, legally referred to as "native title."
Quoting Stephen Gilchrist, a lecturer of Indigenous art at the University of Sydney, museum curator Park Ga-hee stated that paintings, sculptures, handicrafts and performances led by Aboriginal people began to be recognized by the Australian court as historical proof of their continuous and unbroken connection to the land, thus contributing to their rights to native title.
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| "Iwantja" (2021) by the Iwantja Women's Collaborative (Betty Muffler, Nellie Coulthard, Maringka Burton, Betty Chimney, Judith Walkabout, Priscilla Singer, Rosalind Tjanyari, Raylene Walatinna) / Courtesy of the artists, Iwantja Arts and RAFT artspace |
Another displayed piece with a fascinating story was produced by the Iwantja Women's Collaborative from Iwantja Arts, an Aboriginal Art center located in the desert country of Indulkana community in the southern part of Australia.
The reason for this single canvas to depict such diverse patterns and shapes is due to the fact that it is born from the collaboration of multiple women of different generations.
"In a workshop-like setting, members of the community would gather in front of the canvas and each portray their own memories and experiences of the surrounding landscape ― like a collaborative map," Park explained. "On display are two works from Women's and Men's Collaboratives."
The key aspect is the intergenerational cooperation, as veteran artists serve as mentors to share their knowledge with their younger counterparts. "Iwantja" was led by Betty Muffler and Nellie Coulthard, the community's respected elders and traditional healers ("Ngangkari"), who encouraged the artistic participation of young women.
"There are specific stories and knowledge which are connected to women, and there are some that are connected to men," Glass-Kantor said, explaining the reason for the separation of the collaboratives according to the members' gender. "So when they work together, it's a safe space to share particular stories that belong to you and that get passed on to you."
Although the exhibition features thought-provoking Aboriginal art pieces, ultimately, its broader aim lies in presenting the breadth and diversity of contemporary art from Australia that allows the viewers to experience the cycle of unlearning and relearning.
"What's really important isn't where [the artists] come from or their identity, but… the ways in which they are innovating and thinking about how those forms of contact can transform ideas of culture," Artspace's executive director added.
"Un/Learning Australia" runs through March 6, 2022, at SeMA.
