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y separately published work icon Courting Blakness : Recalibrating Knowledge in the Sandstone University selected work   criticism  
Issue Details: First known date: 2015... 2015 Courting Blakness : Recalibrating Knowledge in the Sandstone University
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AbstractHistoryArchive Description

'In a bold and unprecedented project, acclaimed international artist Fiona Foley curated a cutting edge installation in the University of Queensland's sandstone Great Court. Universities have traditionally been elite institutions, overlooking and undervaluing the knowledge contributions of Indigenous thinkers, activists and artists. This history is etched into the walls of the Great Court, with anachronistic concepts of humanity and racial difference revealed in many of friezes and sculptural reliefs. Fiona Foley and her team of eight Aboriginal artists aimed to challenge these concepts...'

Exhibitions

10190354
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Notes

  • Foreword by Larissa Behrendt, June 2015.

  • This work is in six parts:

    Part One: Architecture, Space and Possession

    Part Two: History, Identity and Power

    Part Three: Haunting Institutions of Settler-Colonialism

    Part Four: 14 Nations: Flagging Sovereignty

    Part Five: Debt

    Part Six: The Blaktism

Contents

* Contents derived from the St Lucia, Indooroopilly - St Lucia area, Brisbane - North West, Brisbane, Queensland,:University of Queensland Press , 2015 version. Please note that other versions/publications may contain different contents. See the Publication Details.
Recalibrating Knowledge in the Sandstone University, Fiona Jean Nicoll , single work criticism
'Courting Blakness: Recalibrating Knowledge in the Sandstone University was a platform of cultural and political experimentation that culminated in a unique progran of original art, research, teaching and staff training at the University of Queensland from 5 to 28 September in 2014...'
 (p. 2-13)
Note: Includes notes and illustrations.
The Politics of Art and Place, Fiona Foley , Louise Martin-Chew , single work criticism
'Courting Blakness...was a ground-breaking and historic event that comprised a public art installation in the heart of the University of Queensland's hallowed Great Court and a two-day symposium that extended the Indigenous debate in Australia into unprecedented areas...'
 (p. 14-21)
Finding Country : A Strategy for the City, Kevin O'Brien , single work criticism
'...in a new millennium, what remains a distinct and haunting reality is that the Australian city has not yet come to terms with those origins located deep in the Australian continent..'
 (p. 24-31)
History Receding : The Complicity of Australian Architecture in Colonisation and Beyond, Kelly Greenop , single work criticism
In this essay the author argues that within Australian architectural history there remains a colonial blind spot, a failure to see the important entanglements of Aboriginal and settler societies that are the backdrop for much of Queensland's nineteenth and twentieth-century architecture...'
 (p. 32-39)
Architectures of Possession : Courting Blakness in the University of Queensland's Great Court, Louise Chiodo , single work criticism
'I arrive at the University of Queensland on the ferry, making my way up the hill past carious buildings and through the spaces they create, before stepping out onto the lawn and striking the sandstone that is the Great Court. This is the university's first building and its symbolic centre...'
 (p. 40-47)
A Blak Woman Walks through a Blakened Landscape : Contemporary Indigenous Art and the Making of History, Katrina Schlunke , single work criticism
'The blakened landscape of Australia includes the Great Court of the University of Queensland where in installation of Indigenous art simultaneously revealed the absence of a clearly marked and thriving Indigenous presence and the existence of multiple representations of Indigenous peoples by the university in order to claim 'antiquity', 'development, 'care' and history itself...'
 (p. 50-59)
Persistence, Memory and Being, Djon Mundine , single work criticism
'...Although conflict between Aboriginal and European colonists occurred right from the beginning of the Australian colony, it was not seen at the time or in subsequent official histories as a 'war' in the legal sense; a was has never official been declared at any time in the past 2000 years...'
 (p. 60-65)
The Honey and the Bunny : A Student Reflects, Jessica Brodie , single work criticism

'At first, Karla Dickens' video installation The Honey and the Bunnymight look a little out of place against the timeworn friezes of the Great Court at the University of Queensland...'

 (p. 66-69)
In Conversation with Karla Dickens, Louise Martin-Chew , single work interview
Lousie Martin-Chew speaks with Karla Dickens about her short artistic film The Honey and the Bunny.
 (p. 70-75)
Of Old and New : Messages Conveyed by Australian Universities, Bronwyn Fredericks , single work criticism
'On arriving at the University of Queensland, I walked from where the taxi dropped me off towards the Great Court. As I walked I could see the carvings in the sandstone on the facade of the building in from of me...'
 (p. 78-87)
'I Am Small at the Wharf's Edge' : The Poetic Place of Haunting, Natalie Harkin , single work criticism
'My family is from Point Pearce, Narungga Country, in South Australia. We have a three-mission history common to many Aboriginal families in this state: being forcibly moved and re-moved between Poonindie Mission, Point McLeary Mission (Raukkan and Point Pearce Mission Station, across disparate regions of South Australia...'
 (p. 88-99)
Settler Fantasies, Elizabeth Strakosch , single work criticism
'In response to the Courting Blakness exhibition, and to the works of Fiona Foley and Larissa Behrendt more specifically, I want to take up the question of Australian colonial fantasies...'
 (p. 100-109)
Who Belongs in the Nation?, Sally Babidge , single work criticism
'I enjoy the potential of public space installation art like Courting Blakness to prod audiences beyond acknowledgement of Aboriginal people as traditional owners and into thinking more about the history of intercultural relations in Australia...'
 (p. 112-117)
14 Nations, Archie Moore , single work criticism
'...The pathway led to the Forgan Smith tower and my eye was drawn to the five flags flying on top. The five light posts that align the pathway took on an image of flagpoles in my mind, and I thought about the public's aware mess of the many nations that existed here before European arrival and the nationhood that has been rendered invisible for the past 200 and more years...'
 (p. 118-123)
An Unsettling Presence : Indigenous Art and Settler Law, Heather Douglas , Jo Besley , single work criticism
'The Courting Blakness exhibition included video works...projected onto the carved scenes of Indigenous life flanking the word 'law' in the Great Court of the University of Queensland. Usually these carvings remain unnoticed by those who pass through or relax in the Great Court because they are so high up. However the projections emphasised their presence and their content...'
 (p. 124-133)
Debt, Ryan Presley , single work criticism
'Debt engages with transaction, obligation and exchange in Western culture and current colonialism....'
 (p. 136 - 141)
Change, Ambiguity and Art, Maurice O'Riordan , single work criticism
''Ryan Presley's Debt places Indigenous Australians at the centre of the national economy as figureheads on Australian currency...'
 (p. 142-155)
Indigenous Currency : The Art of Being a Guest, Alice Te Punga Somerville , single work criticism
Ryan Presley's work titled Debt is a sculpture that spells 'change' with an 'x' in the front, so it reads as 'change' as well as 'exchange'...'
 (p. 156-163)
The Blaktism and the Transit between Selves : The Politics of Entagled Lives in Settler-Colonialism, Morgan Brigg , single work criticism
'Who we are, Aboriginal and settler, is central to complex and challenging political questions that wrack settler-colonial nations and relationships...'
 (p. 164-173)
Authentic Aborigine : White Phantasy, Romaine Moreton , single work criticism
'...If the term 'Aborigine' is not a reference to the body, then what is the function of the symbolic Aborigine in Western civilisation? And, as importantly, why is it imposed on the Indigenous peoples of the land now known as Australia?...'
 (p. 174-183)
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Publication Details of Only Known VersionEarliest 2 Known Versions of

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Related Works

y separately published work icon Courting Blakness Fiona Jean Nicoll , 2015 9126885 2015 website

'Courting Blakness: Recalibrating Knowledge in the Sandstone University was a groundbreaking exhibition curated by UQ Adjunct Professor, Fiona Foley. Located in the University of Queensland’s Great Court between September 5-28 in 2014, the project brought together works in different media by Ryan Presley, Archie Moore, Rea, Natalie Harkin, Karla Dickens, Christian Thompson, Megan Cope and Michael Cook.' (Source: About webpage)

The content of the website was transferred to AustLit in 2017 and can be explored here.
VIEW ALL RELATED WORKS (1)

Works about this Work

Courting Blakness : Recalibrating Knowledge in the Sandstone University Carol Schwartzman , 2014 single work criticism
— Appears in: Hecate , vol. 39 no. 1/2 2014; (p. 206-216) 'The Great Court of The University of Queensland at St Lucia is an everyday agora for students, staff and visitors, and a fondly-appreciated public space. Built and branded to underscore commitment to the development of Queensland's tertiary educational system, to secure the University's entry onto the list of elite "sandstone universities" dotted across Australia, and to create an iconic symbol of UQ's presence,1 (Moore, 19) the Great Court is lovely on a breezy, late spring afternoon, but it is by no means a neutral space/territory for everyone: the St Lucia campus is built upon Jagera and Turrbal country.' (Abstract)
Review : Courting Blakness : Recalibrating Knowledge in the Sandstone University Yamini Krishna , 2014 single work review
— Appears in: Australian Women’s Book Review , vol. 26 no. 1/2 2014; (p. 32-36)
— Review of Courting Blakness : Recalibrating Knowledge in the Sandstone University 2015 selected work criticism

'The book Courting Blakness: Recalibrating Knowledge in the Sandstone University comes as a part of the art project ‘Courting Blakness,’ curated by the artist Fiona Foley, a Badtjala artist and Adjunct Professor at The University of Queensland, and brings together works by Ryan Presley, Archie Moore, Rea, Natalie Harkin, Karla Dickens, Christian Thompson, Megan Cope and Michael Cook. The art works, the live discussions, the website documenting the project, and finally the book – which reflects upon the art works, artists, the historical context of the work and the university space, are all integral parts of the project. The project invited these artists to reflect on identity, Aboriginality, the Australian nation, Western education, and architecture in the space of The University of Queensland. The book is a collection of essays, reflections and conversations fostered by the Courting Blakness project. ' (Author's introduction)
Review : Courting Blakness : Recalibrating Knowledge in the Sandstone University Yamini Krishna , 2014 single work review
— Appears in: Australian Women’s Book Review , vol. 26 no. 1/2 2014; (p. 32-36)
— Review of Courting Blakness : Recalibrating Knowledge in the Sandstone University 2015 selected work criticism

'The book Courting Blakness: Recalibrating Knowledge in the Sandstone University comes as a part of the art project ‘Courting Blakness,’ curated by the artist Fiona Foley, a Badtjala artist and Adjunct Professor at The University of Queensland, and brings together works by Ryan Presley, Archie Moore, Rea, Natalie Harkin, Karla Dickens, Christian Thompson, Megan Cope and Michael Cook. The art works, the live discussions, the website documenting the project, and finally the book – which reflects upon the art works, artists, the historical context of the work and the university space, are all integral parts of the project. The project invited these artists to reflect on identity, Aboriginality, the Australian nation, Western education, and architecture in the space of The University of Queensland. The book is a collection of essays, reflections and conversations fostered by the Courting Blakness project. ' (Author's introduction)
Courting Blakness : Recalibrating Knowledge in the Sandstone University Carol Schwartzman , 2014 single work criticism
— Appears in: Hecate , vol. 39 no. 1/2 2014; (p. 206-216) 'The Great Court of The University of Queensland at St Lucia is an everyday agora for students, staff and visitors, and a fondly-appreciated public space. Built and branded to underscore commitment to the development of Queensland's tertiary educational system, to secure the University's entry onto the list of elite "sandstone universities" dotted across Australia, and to create an iconic symbol of UQ's presence,1 (Moore, 19) the Great Court is lovely on a breezy, late spring afternoon, but it is by no means a neutral space/territory for everyone: the St Lucia campus is built upon Jagera and Turrbal country.' (Abstract)
VIEW ALL WORKS ABOUT (2)
Last amended 27 Oct 2016 12:14:35
Subjects:
  • University of Queensland, St Lucia, Indooroopilly - St Lucia area, Brisbane - North West, Brisbane, Queensland,
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