Uninnocent Landscapes
Ian Terry
Daily opening times:
3 – 13 November, 2023
10am – 4pm
Variation to opening times:
On Monday 6 November, the exhibition will open from 1pm to 4pm.
On Thursday 9 November, the exhibition will be open from 12 noon to 4pm.
Uninnocent Landscapes is a research-based photographic investigation into the impact of invasion and dispossession on the landscape of Lutruwita/Tasmania, and the artist’s standing as a non-Indigenous person on this colonised land.
Uninnocent landscapes is a research-based photographic investigation into the impact of invasion, colonisation and dispossession on the landscape of Lutruwita/Tasmania. Without invasion and the near destruction of Lutruwita’s First People, I would not have had the opportunity to lead the rich and fulfilling life I have experienced on this island. This is a reality that, as much as we might try to ignore it, non-Indigenous Tasmanians cannot escape. How do we come to terms with our privilege and its Janus face, the violent and continuing dispossession of Palawa and Pakana.
Ten years in conception, Uninnocent Landscapes is the result of two years combining landscape photography and historical enquiry, seeking answers to the myriad questions that I found myself asking as I traced the path of George Augustus Robinson’s 1831 Big River Mission. Robinson’s ‘missions’ resulted in the removal of Lutruwita’s First People to exile at Wybalenna on Flinders Island. The questions I found myself asking included: What memories to the landscapes of Lutruwita hold? What stories are embedded in the rocks, the trees and grasses, the waters of rivers and lakes? What could the landscape tell me about invasion and the attempted destruction of First Peoples life and culture? What could it tell us about our own lives here on this island?
With Chelsea Watego’s observation that ‘on any given day, in any given place, you can guarantee that most if not all colonisers have no idea whose land they are walking, working or talking on’ (Another Day in the Colony, UQP, 2021) in mind, I sought to know this island and its First Peoples more deeply, to acknowledge their story of tens of thousands of years on this land. I do not attempt to provide a Palawa history of Lutruwita – that would be both inappropriate and impossible. Rather, the project uses monochrome photography paired with quotes from Robinson’s journals to tell one truth of our shared history and documents one of its impact on the land.
All proceeds from this exhibition and the accompanying book will be donated to the Aboriginal Land Council of Tasmania’s Giving Land Back fund. Giving Land Back, or donating to the fund, is one way everyone can help, knowing that land will be owned by the whole Aboriginal Community in perpetuity. You can find the Giving Land Back Program at https://www.givinglandback.org/
