Latest news with #Kalkadoon
The Guardian
05-04-2025
- General
- The Guardian
‘The stories were always there, they kept us strong': surviving one of the darkest periods of Queensland's colonial past
When Ena Sam emerged from a year-long stay in hospital, recovering from a severe kidney infection that led to both her hands and feet being amputated, her family was understandably concerned about her welfare. 'I said 'There's nothing wrong with me',' she recalls. 'I might have lost a few body parts but it didn't affect my spirit, aye?' Her toughness is characteristic of her people, the Kalkadunga (Kalkadoon) – whose survival of one of the darkest periods of Queensland's colonial past has inspired a new exhibition, The unbroken spirit of the Kalkadoons. For Ena, this spirit was forged by the campfire in a small compound in outback Queensland where, as a young girl, she would sit under the stars to hear stories from her elders. 'As soon as that sun went down, all the old people made the kids sit down and listen,' she says. They told the Dreaming story of how their ancestral totem, the black cockatoo, first emerged from a sacred mound on the edge of the Leichhardt River, and conjured images of her people living in huts of spinifex and mud on their country in north-western Queensland – until the arrival of the pale-skinned newcomers, whom they mistook for yaannyi (ghosts). Some nights the stories were chilling. One told of two Kalkadunga sisters, around 14, tied to a pole at a men's camp. Their family had just been slaughtered by settlers on horseback, according to the oral history passed down through generations. The girls had tried to run, but were captured. Chained up for weeks, they refused to eat, believing the food to be poisoned. Eventually, on the brink of starvation, they relented. The sisters were separated and sent to work on different cattle stations, never to see each other again. One of them was Ena's grandmother, who recounted the story to her by the firelight. In the 1980s, living in Brisbane as a single mother of five, Ena would pass on the tales to her children, illustrating them by making huts out of sticks, drawing pictures in the sand, moulding animals from playdough and gesturing to hidden shapes in the stars. Ena's daughter, Colleen Sam, says her mother's stories turned their home into a sanctuary from the racism she encountered as a child. 'We didn't know if we were going to be abused that day or if something was going to be thrown out the window at us,' Colleen says. 'But when we came home … the stories were always there, and they kept us strong.' Sign up for the fun stuff with our rundown of must-reads, pop culture and tips for the weekend, every Saturday morning Sometimes Ena would sketch simple pencil illustrations, but the drawings – believed to be the first visual record of her family history – were boxed up, and the knowledge remained a closely held secret. When Ena developed sepsis in 2017, and her heart became too weak to pump blood to her hands and feet, it was the catalyst to finally share it with the world. 'It was like a fine string,' says Colleen. 'If that had been cut and Mum was the main one carrying it, then it would have just been lost.' Tales once whispered around a campfire are now on display at the State Library of Queensland. 'It's like all that hidden knowledge has come to light,' says Colleen. The exhibition traces the journey of the Kalkadoon from the first sightings of white colonists in the 1840s to the decades of bloody resistance that followed, culminating with the Kalkadoon's last stand at Battle Mountain – known as 'the big finish up' – where the warriors were finally outgunned and the survivors forced to flee to neighbouring lands. The history is captured in stark detail in paintings by Colleen, a visual artist, alongside Ena's original pencil sketches and historical archives showing the contrasting ways the bloodshed was described by the colonial forces. The cavernous exhibition space is alive with the sounds of the bush: steady rain, the call of the black cockatoo and the crack of thunder – mentally transporting visitors to Kalkadoon country, as Ena did with her children. The final section comprises brightly coloured paintings of ancient Dreaming stories that leap off the wall – a defiant celebration of Kalkadoon culture. 'Because that survived,' says Colleen. The unbroken spirit of the Kalkadoons runs at the State Library of Queensland until 24 August
The Guardian
04-03-2025
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
Juno Gemes' book Until Justice Comes: 50 years of Aboriginal art and activism
David Dhalatnghu Gulpilil, Yolŋu dancer, actor and cultural teacher, plays yidaki (Yolŋu for the didgeridoo unique to East Arnhem Land) at Cooee Aboriginal Art Gallery in Paddington, Sydney, 1986 Eastern Arrernte and Kalkadoon man Charlie Perkins, chair of the Aboriginal Development Commission, with his wife Eileen Perkins at the Handback ceremony, Uluru-Kata Tju, 1985 Wiradjuri tennis champion Evonne Goolagong Cawley wins the White City Women's Tennis Tournament at the International Tennis Tournament, Sydney, 1982 Phillip Langley, a dancer from Mornington Island, at an Aboriginal and Islander Dance Theatre dress rehearsal at Three Space, Union Theatre, the University of Sydney, 1978 Four generations together: Granny Simpson with a portrait of her mother, Marjorie Peters-Little, her daughter Frances, and Frances's son James Henry at Granny Simpson's house, Sydney, 2005 African American writer and civil rights activist James Baldwin on the rooftop of the Athenaeum Hotel, London, 1976 Countrymen elders Norman Brown, Gerry Brown and Billy Kooippa from Aurukun and Mornington Island greet each other before Ceremony on Mornington Island, 1978 Former prime minister Gough Whitlam, Pastor Ossie Cruse (chair of the National Aboriginal Congress) and Michael Anderson (of the Aboriginal Legal Service) before they lobby African nations to boycott the Commonwealth Games, Sydney airport press room, 1981 Kamilaroi Elder Bill Reid casts his vote at the 1981 National Aboriginal Congress election in Redfern Artist and actor Wandjuk Djuakan Marika plays yidaki on the way to the Apmira Artists for Land Rights exhibition in Sydney, 1981 Kids on the Block in Redfern, 1980 Author and historian Ruby Langford Ginibi visits poet Robert Adamson and photographer Juno Gemes on the Hawkesbury River, NSW in 1994 Darren carries the Sacred Fire from the Aboriginal Tent Embassy, outside Old Parliament House, before the then prime minister Kevin Rudd's apology to the Stolen Generations, March 2008 Anangu Minyma Law woman Nura Ward, who believed that being collaborative and wanting to share her knowledge with non-Indigenous women would ensure the continuity of her culture Prof Marcia Langton backstage at the 2013 Deadly awards at the Sydney Opera House, where she presented the inaugural Marcia Langton lifetime award for leadership Then prime minister Kevin Rudd invited Stolen Generations members Netta Cahill, Lorna Cubillo and Valerie Day to witness the presentation of the apology in the House of Representatives. They comfort each other after the reading of the bill on 13 February 2008 Anangu Law woman Nelly Patterson, family and community members dance during the Uluru Handback 25th anniversary celebration in 2010 The Sacred Fire is always kept burning at the Redfern Aboriginal Tent Embassy, 2014
