By ERWIN CHLANDA
A steering committee to create a national Indigenous art centre in Alice Springs will be set up in the next couple of months, says Scott Lovett, of the Department of the Chief Minister.
He says he and Department of Arts head Hugo Leschen are following calls for such a facility from several local community members.
Alice is the logical place for the centre and “local thinking about it is quite well developed. It’s been talked about for many years,” he says.
Neither budget nor location within Alice Springs have been discussed at this point: The first task is to work out what the facility should be like and what it should do, he says.
It’s likely mission is to represent the 200-plus Indigenous language groups around Australia, in an arts centre “on Arrernte land”.
Because of its national reach, there would need to be a role by the Federal Government but so far no official contact with Canberra has been made, and no talks about funding have taken place, says Mr Lovett.
Sunday, April 21, 2024
The freedom of the press still furnishes that check upon government which no constitution has ever been able to provide – Chicago Tribune.
Is it a National Indigenous Art Centre that is being called for – or more broadly an Indigenous Cultural Centre?
The more we can all learn and share (and I speak as a local) the more we all benefit.
If you spend some time in Longreach, you can visit the Stockman’s Hall of Fame with its different galleries and, across the road, the QANTAS Founder’s Museum.
The grounds of the former are spaciously planted with natives and on several sandstone plinths, certain poems are inscribed that define the Women of the West and the Men of the Open Spaces. The story of the latter combines the original hangar in which QANTAS engineers build the DH50 on licence. It is almost a hundred years old and is decked out with period furnishings.
Occasionally, the recording of a biplane aircraft flying overhead fills the spacious tin hangar that stands in the sun beside the café and other galleries of the museum. At present, the stories of Vietnam Vets fill one of them.
All of this, apart from the tidy streets, serve to create a sense of palpable history, reminding one of what was achieved in this country over the past hundred years.
The focus is on spaciousness and national character. Alice Springs could do worse than follow this kind of model.