Bundanon Unveils 2024 Summer Exhibition Bagan Bariwariganyan: Echoes of Country

Bundanon has unveiled bagan bariwariganyan: echoes of country, an exhibition of new works created by Walbunja/Ngarigo artist Aunty Cheryl Davison, Gweagal/Wandiwandian artist Aunty Julie Freeman, and  Wiradyuri/Kamilaroi artist Jonathan Jones, open until 9 February 2025.

Celebrating South Coast stories and upholding local Aboriginal values and kinships, this major collaboration between the renowned First Nations artists features a large-scale architectural gunyah structure made from Bundanon’s Turpentine (Syncarpia glomulifera) trees, a 75-metre-long mural tracking the coastline from Sydney to just over the Victorian border, a suite of paintings, and ambitious large-scale screenprints. The season also includes drawings by nineteenth century Yuin artist Mickey of Ulladulla, loaned from key collections across Australia, providing a historical anchor point for the new commissions and connecting South Coast narratives from past to present.

Bundanon guest curator, Jonathan Jones, is a member of the Wiradyuri and Kamilaroi peoples of south east Australia and is well known for his evocative site-specific installations and interventions into space. Working across a range of mediums, his work explores and interrogates cultural and historical relationships and ideas from Indigenous perspectives and traditions.

For bagan Bariwariganyan: echoes of country, Jones, supported by Bundanon Curator Boe-Lin Bastian, invited Aunty Julie Freeman and Aunty Cheryl Davison, two significant senior artists and storytellers from the south east whom he has known for many years, to collaborate on this major new project. Both artists’ families are deeply rooted in the NSW South Coast with Aunty Julie Freeman having connections from La Perouse to Wreck Bay and Aunty Cheryl from Wallaga Lake to La Perouse.

In Bundanon’s main gallery space, the three artists have created a large-scale immersive Aboriginal architectural gunyah structure built from over 80 turpentine trees harvested from the Bundanon site. Suspended from the gunyah in the canopy space are screen-printed skyscapes created by Aunty Cheryl Davison, depicting the local creation story of the Glossy Black Cockatoo and Cambewarra Mountain, near Bundanon.

A 75-metre mural by Aunty Julie Freeman and her daughter Markeeta Freeman wraps around the walls of the gallery, illustrating the significant bays, beaches, rivers and mountains that make up the South Coast physical and cultural landscape.

The mural is interspersed with drawings by Mickey of Ulladulla, a rare depiction of early colonisation and the shifting cultural landscape through an Aboriginal viewpoint. On loan from the National Library of Australia, the National Gallery of Australia and the State Library of NSW, this presentation marks the biggest showing of his works in recent years and the first time that many of the works have come back to Country since they were made.

Bundanon’s Gallery 2 will present Aunty Julie Freeman’s first ever major exhibition, Biddi-gal noon-kan-leek (Grandmothers belonging to me), featuring a major suite of paintings that document maternal stories of the plants, animals and weather patterns from across the region’s escarpments, mountains and waterways. Celebrating the continuing strength of women, key paintings are presented alongside cultural objects, further contextualising the stories shared by these living ancestors.

In Gallery 4, Aunty Cheryl Davison’s solo project, Dhawalanj bunbal-ba banggawu (Many trees and Burrawangs), reflects on the traditional use of Burrawang (Macrozamia communis) seeds to make bread with an ambitious installation of hand-woven baskets and a major four panel screenprint. A set of Aunty Cheryl’s soft sculptural figures, created from recycled blankets and carefully decorated, welcome visitors into the exhibition.

Connecting the three gallery spaces are bespoke soundscapes, featuring recordings of local oceans and streams, stories spoken in the local language, and Cockatoo birdsong. These new soundscapes sing the stories of this place, celebrating local traditions and the ongoing collaboration of these three artists and cultural leaders.

Artist Jonathan Jones, said: “Both myself and Bundanon are so lucky to be working with Aunty Julie and Aunty Cheryl, such significant artists who until now have not been given the recognition they truly deserve. This is a really special moment where we can put a spotlight on these extraordinary women and their stories, while creating a project that’s deeply embedded in this place and could only happen at Bundanon.”

Rachel Kent, CEO, Bundanon, said: “Bundanon is thrilled to present bagan bariwariganyan: echoes of country, an exhibition that shares the significance of this place through image and sound, physical immersion and storytelling. This important project celebrates local traditions and the ongoing collaboration between these three important artists and cultural leaders.”

SUMMER AT BUNDANON – LIVE PROGRAMS

Alongside bagan bariwariganyan: echoes of country, Bundanon has also revealed its upcoming summer program of live events including performances by acclaimed Indigenous Australian singer and songwriter Emma Donovan with Yuin choir Djinama Yilaga supporting (11 January); the inaugural Bundanon Artists and Makers Markets, brings together creatives from across the country to showcase and share their products (7 December); Creative Play comes to Bundanon with free art making opportunities; explore Indigenous land management with and a fascinating talk from historian Bill Gammage; and a special in conversation between Uncle Bruce Pasco and artist and researcher Jonathan Jones (12 January) and more.

To celebrate the newly opened Boyd Collection Gallery, Bundanon will also present a series of talks with artists and curators that unpack the influence Arthur Boyd had on his peers and the wider art world including a special concert with international piano soloist Alexander Boyd (8 December).