Post Colonial Fluorescence
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Post Colonial Fluorescence Joan Ross M.F.A. Paper 2012 1 Table of Contents Statement of Originality……………………………………………………………………….3 Abstract………………………………………………………………………………..………7 Prologue…………………………………………………………………………..…..……….8 Introduction……………………………………………………………………………………9 Hi Vis Colonisation (Becoming Invisible)……………………………………….…………..15 Hi Vis Society………………………………………………………………………...17 Joan Ross: Enter at your own risk……………………………………………………………27 When I grow up I want to be a forger………………………………………………………..40 Barbie Bush………………………………………………………………………….…….....61 Take 1: BBQ this Sunday BYO…………………………………………………………...…90 Conclusion………………………………………………………………………………….121 Epilogue…………………………………………………………………………………….124 Table of Images......………………………………………………………………………....125 Bibliography………………………………………………………………………………...135 2 Statement of Originality I hereby declare that this submission is my own work and that, to the best of my knowledge and belief, it contains no written material previously published by another person, except where due knowledge Is made in the text Signed………………………………………………………………………….. 3 ‘What happened between these un-like peoples when they met on the edge of a continent?’ 1 1 Inga Clendinnen, Dancing With Strangers: Europeans and Australians at first contact (New York Cambridge: University press, 2005), 2. 4 Municipal Gum Gumtree in the city street, Hard bitumen around your feet, Rather you should be In the cool world of leafy forest halls And wild bird calls Here you seems to me Like that poor cart-horse Castrated, broken, a thing wronged, Strapped and buckled, its hell prolonged, Whose hung head and listless mien express Its’ hopelessness. Municipal gum, it is dolorous To see you thus Set in your black grass of bitumen O fellow citizen, What have they done to us? ‘Municipal Gum’ - by Oodgeroo Noonuccal (Kath Walker)2 2 Kath Walker, My People: A Kath Walker Collection (Sydney: Jacaranda, 1981), 53. 5 I would like to thank my family and friends for putting up with me… 6 Abstract This thesis investigates the early European colonization of Australia with particular interest in first contact and Imperialism. It is critical of High Visibility (Hi Vis) clothing and considers the 'creep' and colonising agency of Hi Vis, as a metaphor for the pervasive forces of White Colonialism and broader power relationships within Australia. The incorporation of fiction and private recollections provides insight into how the emotional characterises my work as well as engages with the narrative and fictive construction of Australian history. My working methodologies will be central considerations. Particularly, the videos When I grow up I want to be a forger (2010), BBQ this Sunday, BYO (2011) and the sculptural installation, Joan Ross: Enter at your own risk (2010). Drawing specific attention to: history, memory, the absurd, the significance of materials, paradox and the personal. 7 Prologue I often float out into the ocean, looking back at the land, just imagining. I love trees, I love nature, I love water, love Hi Vis, hate HI Vis, I hate consumer society, I hate pretension and arrogance, I dislike interiors shops and puffy pillows and neat houses with statues and ornaments and the obsession with these things. I also hate clichés and stereotypes, you can’t live with them, yet, you can’t live without them. I hate colonisation, I don’t enjoy the notion of ‘being civilised’. One of the synonyms for civilised is enlightened… I think it is the opposite, ‘civilised’ has holes in it, blind spots and ignorance. 8 Introduction Figure 1. Joan Ross, BBQ this Sunday (The end of the world as we know it3) 2011, digital pigment print on premium photo paper, 76 x 42.5 cm. Australian colonisation is a car crash. When I think of the colonials on the 26th February 1788… their ceremony and their singing of the English national anthem or something similarly patriotic as they planted their flag, to take (unlawful) possession of the Land, I feel a little hysterical. I feel like I’ve always known that this was the scene of a crime. 3 With all the titles of my works I have capitalised only the first letter. This is with the exception of people’s names or where an acronym is present in the title. 9 Edward Said in his seminal text ‘Culture and Imperialism’ argues that colonialism and racism are part of the liberal tradition. He accounts for the illusion of colonial superiority imposed upon the indigenous, asserting that: Almost all colonial schemes begin with the assumption of native backwardness and general inadequacy to be independent, 'equal', and fit’.4 This ideological and binary construction of the colonisers and ‘colonised’ has been used to validate white superiority over ‘uncivilised’ Aboriginal peoples. This has caused devastation. Steven Ross articulates these resonating effects, maintaining that the white invaders’ conquering of Aborigines has resulted in “the breaking down of traditional social, political and economic structure – cultural and physical genocide.” 5 The influx of High Visibility work-wear into our world is a disease. High visibility (Hi Vis) clothing is colonizing our country whether we like it or not. Its luminosity has infiltrated all facets of our lives in an insidious and powerful way, bringing with it elements of: fear, demarcation, ownership and authority over spaces and land. 4 Edward Said, Culture and Imperialism (London, Random House,1994), 96. 5 Stephen Ross. Western Science and Aboriginal People. http://www.cityofsydney.nsw.gov.au/barani/themes/theme9.htm (accessed November 15, 2010). 10 In this sense, the 'creep' and colonising forces of Hi Vis are metaphors for the pervasive forces of White Colonialism and broader power relationships within Australia. In my work, I aim to expose the creeping invasion of Hi Vis as a marker of colonisation and its authority and engage with processes of subversion. Particularly, I weave the past, present and a potential future with the absurd to highlight my distaste for being ‘civilized’ and scrutinize the relationships between the natural and civilized and Hi Vis in relation to: colonization, ownership, authority, fear, and the personal. Through this process, I aim to encourage an open dialogue that addresses what has occurred and is occurring to the Aboriginal communities and the apathy that surrounds the social and cultural issues facing indigenous peoples. Figure 2. Poster used on Australia Day by Occupy Australia for Aboriginal rights. Characteristic of these processes is a work I constructed in 2007, The Emperor’s New Clothes (2007) (fig. 3). I constructed a portrait of a nude Captain James Cook out of scarred kangaroo 11 fur with the scarring going across his chest. It was mainly kangaroo fur but some rabbit and mink fur were also included to reconfigure the Captain as an introduced species. His European clothes’, also made out of different furs lay crumpled on the floor. This literal and symbolic disrobing functioned on two levels. Firstly, it showed he had disrobed with the intention of wanting an equal and open discussion with the indigenous peoples. His nudity was also meant to humanize him, making him vulnerable and taking away the protection that clothes offer. Particularly, by stripping away the authority of the uniform. Yet, The Emperor’s New Clothes exclusion from the Opening night of Drawing Together 2007 and from the RBS emerging artist award in 2008, due to it being a nude picture of Captain James Cook, suggests to me that dated and default attitudes from 200 years of white settlement may still be prevalent today. 12 Figure 3. Joan Ross, The Emperor’s new clothes, 2007, 200 cm x 100 cm, (irregular). 13 In this paper, my working methodologies will be central considerations. Particularly, the videos When I grow up I want to be a forger (2010), BBQ this Sunday, BYO (2011) and the sculptural installation, Joan Ross: Enter at your own risk (2010) will be subject to inquiry. I will draw specific attention to: history, memory, the absurd, the significance of materials, reconfiguration of colonial landscapes, paradox and the personal. The seemingly disparate incorporation(s) of fiction and private recollections provides insight into how the emotional characterizes my work as well as engages with the narrative and fictive construction of Australian history. A survey of Hi Vis’ positions in society and popular culture will clarify the connections I make between it and the insidious, seeping nature of Australian colonization. 14 Hi Vis Colonisation: Becoming Invisible Figure 4. Advertising billboard on M4 at Prospect NSW 2011. Story No.1: Hi Vis is the new black Since Joseph (Lycett)6 was only new to Australia I’d decided we’d head to the Blue Mountains for some sightseeing. When we arrived at Blackheath we were hungry. Joe recalled someone mentioning the reputation of the pies in Blackheath, he had a fine palate and his love of painting and all its associated sensibilities meant he could move just as easily in the culinary world. Sometimes I think he would have done equally as well as a food critic if he hadn’t had such a love of and ability for copying money. 6 See page 43 in the Chapter When I grow up I want to be a forger, for further information 15 As we entered the pie pub we were both immediately overwhelmed by a glow of Hi Vis. The road workers nearby on their lunchbreak had also heard of this town’s pie reputation and there wasn’t a man (or woman) amongst us who wasn’t wearing some form of Hi Vis Fluoro vest or jacket. We felt like the odd ones out. Now, Joe made more sense of the billboard we had passed on the freeway. It said “Hi Vis is the new black”, and that I hitherto had trouble explaining. Joseph hadn’t seen anything like this colour before, the way it stood out on the landscape, how beautifully it stood out. Driving along the freeway, now near Blacktown on our way back to the big smoke, all of the tradesman in the cars surrounding us were wearing Hi Vis shirts Orange and yellow clashing horribly as they squashed into the front of those utes, the colours overlapping.