SAMMY HAWKER

2020 BUNDIAN WAY ARTS EXCHANGE | SHARING STORIES GROUP SHOW

ANU School of Art & Design Gallery, ACT
September 14 - October 29, 2021

Three observations, in no particular order: 

• Standing at the shores of Turemulerrer/Twofold Bay I sense myself being watched. Moments later a shadow in the shape of a White-bellied Sea Eagle passes over me. 

• At Charnley River an Azure Kingfisher snatches a frog from the creek and begins to tenderise the frog by whacking it on a nearby branch. When I look away I realise I can distinguish the whack, whack, whack of the frog amidst the cacophony of morning sounds. In that moment I understand more completely that every sound in the Eucalyptus forest around me belongs to a source and that source could be as obscure as an Azure Kingfisher tenderising a frog against a branch. 

• At Scottsdale Bush Heritage Reserve I look at a familiar landscape with new eyes. I have been walking Scottsdale with Ngunawal custodian Tyronne Bell for two days as Tyronne, Jai and Phil conduct a post-fire Cultural Heritage Survey of the land. Tyronne helps me see more and the story of the site begins to reveal itself. The smooth river rocks that scatter the ground are suddenly recognisable as hammer-stones and axeheads. The scars in the trees take the shape of a coolamon or even a shield. 

I feel a difference in myself during these types of moments. My intellectual western mind quietens and my perception broadens beyond the limits of my gaze. I become aware of the way I am holding myself in space and soften my stance. I am more grounded but also more light - as if a stray piece of wind might pick me up and blow me over the horizon but rather than resisting I’ll go with the experience accepting everything it has to offer. 

While the Bundian Way is a physical pathway it is also a concept, a feeling, a reconciliation. A navigation of new territories in the healing process to return with embodied learnings. Reciprocity requires the communication of Indigenous participants willing to educate and share their wisdom and non-Indigenous participants with a genuine interest in active listening and truth-telling.

One of our first conversations on the Arts Exchange is with Wiradjuri woman Alison Simpson. Alison tells us that for her the Bundian Way represents a strong line of intelligent, resilient people with a rich and diverse culture built on love and respect. To Alison the Bundian Way is living, breathing and still telling stories. 

In my photographic practice I examine methods of collaboration with the more-than human. I am interested in what happens when the apparent permanency of a photograph is broken open by decentering my position as the artist and inviting agents of the site to interact with the image. Ocean-water collected from Turemulerrer was used with XTOL in development of the film, the salt from the water leaving residue on the negative and beginning the corrosion of the emulsion for unpredictable results.

Through giving agency to more-than human entities my work intends to embody the act of active listening and potentially help draw attention to the silent histories & cross-species entanglements of the site. 

The artist would like to acknowledge the Traditional Custodians of the land that this body of work was created within the Yuin Nation.