From the Heart

 From my heart & mind: a voice "to" Parliament is not a voice "in" Parliament. If my simple message amidst all the noise out there sways a couple of undecided friends on which way to vote, I will be more than happy. Consider how fortunate we are in this country to be able to have our say - and this is a conscience vote not a political vote - also please keep in mind that our First Nations People did not have this right at all until the 1967 referendum. Please consider this. Go well.

YES ... all that noise ...

There is a lot of talk amongst "the noise" about us all being equal. You all know that according to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights of 1948, Article 1 states that: "All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood".

Some say that here in Australia there is no need for an individual group to have a voice to Parliament, and that we are all equal according to the law. But, in reality, and if we are heartfelt & honest, this is not the case for many minority groups and most seriously for our First Nation's people. Hence our upcoming referendum. Observations follow from both my experience and readings of the Yes and the No cases as I believe that the mental health of our nation could be in peril.

There are a number of very good ethical reasons for a Voice for our First Nations peoples to be enshrined in the Australian constitution. If you wish to read further the Ethics Report on the Voice is available online.

We learned at school that our Constitution was written on a falsehood. The British claimed and colonised the great southern land known then as "Terra Australis Non Cognito" (but strangely enough also called New Holland) as both the French and the Dutch were here as well - not to forget the many islander trading nations. The British claimed, according to international law at the time, that the land was "terra nullius".

This Latin term means “land belonging to no one”, which has been interpreted as a complete absence of people and additionally the absence of “civilised” people capable of land ownership. This premise was obviously false and subsequently the Australian Constitution written was written on this falsehood.

What has happened in this country since then is unconscionable. Most Australians will remember "the White Australia Policy" but if you don't ... you'll find it online too.

Australians will also remember that the claim "terra nullius" was overturned in 1992 by the High Court of Australia's Mabo decision.

Enshrining a Voice to Parliament in the Constitution cannot be undone by any one future political party, group or individual. So in other words it is a very serious amendment to the law upon which this country has been built and not just some airy-fairy talk. It creates serious ethical reparation in writing ... in righting the wrongs and making amendments by moving forward to allow pro-active discussion with all those immediately concerned for the next step, Treaty.

Timeline:

Sixty-odd thousand years or thereabouts, Indigenous peoples continuously live on and from the land

22 August 1770, Captain Cook (journal entry) took possession of all of the east coast of the great south land in the name of the English King, George III

26 January 1788, Captain Arthur Phillip raised the flag of Great Britain

1 January 1901 the Australian Constitution took effect after being passed by a British Act of Parliament in 1900.

1967 a referendum successful in creating citizenship for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders

1992 "terra nullius" overturned in the High Court Mabo Decision recognising Native Title and their continuing connection to the land

2008 Bipartisan support passed the Motion to the House, "Apology to Australia's Indigenous Peoples"

14 October 2023 Referendum. At the time of writing, the outcome is unknown ...

Crystal Ball:

YES vote gets up civility wins and Australians stand proud

NO vote gets up, it's a backward step, civility loses, all Australian's lose and a further stain settles over the Nation which will be hard to recover from this time

As the noise gets more vicious and louder I am tuning out and turning to my drawing board where I shall find solace in making things ...

This Antipodean traveller ...

 

International departures gate Sydney 9 August 2023

I must say there is both a sense of relief and trepidation as I leave the country. Relief, because I can stop all my micro-planning - my itinerary, my workshops, my lesson plans. Trepidation, because I am anxious about what is to come and how will I handle anything that doesn't go to plan. Even though I have ventured through this gate often enough I do know that everything beyond the gate is rather easy and straight forward ... even though I also know that what does go wrong is beyond my control. How does my family cope with me!? I have often been called an intrepid traveller, a label that doesn't quite sit right with me. I can tell you I am very fearful and often anxious though I appear calm most of the time!

This tour will see me visit the United Kingdom, Italy and Belgium where I shall mix with likeminded people or as some of us say in the field my tribe! I have already arrived at the University of Warwick in Coventry right in the heart of the UK. My flight from Australia was uneventful and I was delighted to have been upgraded from cattle-class to premium cattle-class where I was given a bubbles on arrival and every courtesy was offered by the Qantas staff. On the first nine hour leg I watched a couple of movies, ate too much junk, slept a bit ... slept a lot actually then after a strange layover of two hours in Singapore did some more of the same on the thirteen hour second leg. It is a physically draining trip. 

I am bewildered however, by the two hour layover in Singapore. I left the plane along with all the other passengers. Once off I was told to come back to the same gate an hour later to start the security process again even though we couldn't leave the terminal. There were no shops open to browse ... actually there were no shops just gates and I couldn't find a lounge. All the seats were taken and people were strewn around the floor. Very strange indeed. When the time came I queued up to go through security even though I had already been through security to get on the plane I was getting back on to. The security man who I just happen to get by chance, told me to do up my cardigan as it was not acceptable to have only the top two buttons done up ... I had to have them all done up. Let me tell you I had a long sleeved, crew necked top on under my cardigan so this was not a case of the exposed bosom. It was the weirdest request and I am still perplexed. But, I know better than to argue with an airport security officer.

As I said the journey was uneventful, smooth and reasonably pleasant. I arrived at Heathrow and walked the ten minute journey to the Central Bus Station at 7am. My coach to Coventry wasn't until 10am. The place was packed. I decided to ask the ticket office if there were an earlier bus but they told me to come back in an hour because the National Express computer system was "down". Down where I thought. After a coffee and croissant - very nice - I observed the throng of travellers discovering that not only was the computer system "down" but so too the the automated ticket terminals. Travellers could not purchase tickets on the day. Lucky I micro-managed that one from home before leaving. Fortunately the coach interchange platform board was working and gave information on which bay to go to get your bus. The drivers were told to accept funds and allow people to board. It worked.

Leaving the confines of the airport precinct I sat back and relaxed to enjoy the two and a half hour journey. Ahhh, how pleasant. Our first - and last - stop was a mid-sized town not far from Heathrow called Hemel Hempstead. The coach had broken down. The driver said he knew something was wrong but continued to limp into the town rather than stopping on the motorway. If he had have stopped on the motorway not one passenger would have been allowed to get out of the bus - insurance policy condition. Good on the driver!!!!

Most passengers we very understanding and we were all glad the driver managed to get us into the town. The driver was superb in his handling of the situation. His manners and politeness were exemplary. After a few failed attempts and a two hour wait in Hempel Hempstead the National Express company booked several cabs so we could complete our onward journey. For me I was with two other passengers travelling to Coventry. It was a very pleasant hour and a half cab ride ... in the end. 

Welcome to the University of Warwick. I am in the Radcliffe Conference Centre enjoying this beautiful university and its surroundings. I am here for CLASfest, a festival held by the Calligraphy and Lettering Arts Society. I did a campus reconnoitre after breakfast looking for my favourite places to hang out the - co-op bookshop (all universities have them), stationary store and the Library.  Having spent a good of time at University campuses in my life I was surprised to find there was no bookstore ... at all. No stationery store either. There are no longer enough students living and studying on campus these days that their stores had closed. They do have a beautiful Functions & Arts Centre with live performances, arts exhibitions and three cinemas showing six plus screening per day. I think the two cities Coventry and Warwick are heavily invested in the Arts Centre as it is rather grand.

But, the most fun part of my day - so far - was my on-campus supermarket experience this morning. I wandered in to this huge store just browsing my way around when I noticed a big burley bloke hanging about at the end of my aisle, he was trying not to look at me. I thought hmmm what's he up to then. I popped an item here and there into my bag slowly working my way through the aisles as I was in no hurry at all. Then I noticed two blokes keeping an eye on me. So I made my way to the electronic registers with the blokes in mind thinking they were thinking I was going to steal my little collection of goodies. When I got to the registers I asked the assistant if she knew where the campus pharmacy was, she sounded nervous and said she didn't but as I was talking with her the two blokes hovered close by ... ready to pounce. So I moved to a self serve register and started the scanning process. The lass came up to me and said "next time you come into the supermarket do pick up a trolley". I told her I knew something was wrong when I first noticed the blokes watching me then we all fell about laughing. One fellow told me a red flag went up the minute I walked into the store. Though shoplifting is not a laughing matter and obviously the Uni gets a lot of them, I thanked them all kindly for giving me something else fun to talk about with my students! 

Day one ... all but done! 

Uluru Statement from the Heart

... it's only 417 words

read them

and you will know in your heart

what to do ...

U L U R U  S T A T E M E N T  F R O M  T H E  H E A R T

Our Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander tribes were the first sovereign Nations of the Australian continent and its adjacent islands, and possessed it under our own laws and customs. This our ancestors did, according to the reckoning of our culture, from the Creation, according to the common law from ‘time immemorial’, and according to science more than 60,000 years ago. 

This sovereignty is a spiritual notion: the ancestral tie between the land, or ‘mother nature’, and the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples who were born therefrom, remain attached thereto, and must one day return thither to be united with our ancestors. This link is the basis of the ownership of the soil, or better, of sovereignty.It has never been ceded or extinguished, and co-exists with the sovereignty of the Crown. 

How could it be otherwise? That peoples possessed a land for sixty millennia and this sacred link disappears from world history in merely the last two hundred years? 

With substantive constitutional change and structural reform, we believe this ancient sovereignty can shine through as a fuller expression of Australia’s nationhood. 

Proportionally, we are the most incarcerated people on the planet. We are not an innately criminal people. Our children are aliened from their families at unprecedented rates. This cannot be because we have no love for them. And our youth languish in detention in obscene numbers. They should be our hope for the future. 

These dimensions of our crisis tell plainly the structural nature of our problem. This is the torment of our powerlessness. 

We seek constitutional reforms to empower our people and take a rightful place in our own country. When we have power over our destiny our children will flourish. They will walk in two worlds and their culture will be a gift to their country. 

We call for the establishment of a First Nations Voice enshrined in the Constitution. 

Makarrata is the culmination of our agenda: the coming together after a struggle. It captures our aspirations for a fair and truthful relationship with the people of Australia and a better future for our children based on justice and self-determination. 

We seek a Makarrata Commission to supervise a process of agreement-making between governments and First Nations and truth-telling about our history. 

In 1967 we were counted, in 2017 we seek to be heard. We leave base camp and start our trek across this vast country. We invite you to walk with us in a movement of the Australian people for a better future.

For more information please visit:   https://yes23.com.au/

A life of learning and curiosity continues ...

1991 Photograph by Michael Thorne

It was 1986 when I was approached by the Crafts Council of the ACT to teach calligraphy. I had only been learning calligraphy for a few years though I was already through my Showcard and Ticket Writing and Sign-writing Certificate and well into my Diploma of Calligraphy and Bookbinding through the Roehampton Institute UK. I felt I was neither ready to teach nor prepared for it but the lass on the end of the phone said she had seen my work and would I be prepared to "give it a go"? So I did.

Thirty-seven years later and after a lifetime of learning, sharing and guiding others, the time has come for me to farewell the classroom and the zoom room due to a rise in lecture & presentation requests and my ever increasing want to add to my artistic collection and calligraphic repertoire. All my current teaching commitments will be met until the close of 2023. How fortunate to have made so many friends here in Australia and around the world and to have have the opportunity to travel and learn and share extensively in my field. I have been wanted, welcomed and included.

I know I will miss the classroom and all that that preparation, research and experimentation involves. I see the move however, as an exciting step in into a world of curiosity and learning and I am truly keen to know where it will end up. My studio and its contents beckon me. My mind is brimming with ideas, research initiatives, articles to be written and just the pure urge to make more things with my hands.

There will still be travel. There will still be a sharing though my lecture series and there will still be calligraphic works telling the story of my own zeitgeist. It is, after all my purpose here. There are also some very special people who I will enjoy spending some more quality time with. And, here are some of them.

Hamish and Mads, serious and curious about making things.

A beaut way to start the year ...

 

Twenty-twenty-three has come at last. Let's all hope it is better than the past few years have been and the world settles into a more pleasant place than what it has been. This year I am determined to find my creative gene again.

I am fortunate in that my year has started beautifully. Getting back into the classroom with ten dedicated and delightful participants was pure balm for the soul. 

The Sturt Summer School in the Southern Highlands of NSW saw two hundred participants and tutors come together for five days of creativity in multiple disciplines. It is always enjoyable meeting new people both tutors and students. The grounds alone, full of beauty, inspire creativity.

The weather was gloriously cool. I first went to Frensham in 1988 and took a class with Sydney friend and calligrapher Helen Warren. Then a class with the beautiful & talented Elaine Witton. The summer schools were then run by the World Education Fellowship. I have enjoyed teaching at Frensham many times over the years and feel privileged to be invited. Sturt Centre for Contemporary Craft has been running both winter & summer schools since 2009 (I think).

This year I called my workshop "Writing & Illuminating & Lettering" as a homage to Edward Johnston. This is the name of his book ... the calligraphers bible ... first published in 1904. The course was skill based not project driven so we did lots of small experiments and had a great deal of fun doing just that. No pressure, just fun. A few random shots follow:

Tony sketched David while chatting in the rec room.

The calligraphic line ... lettering with a shell

A bit of letter-building

The last evening reward

Building more letters

The calligraphic line - illuminating with a shell

The calligraphic line ... with a shell

Demonstrating under the document camera

Almost candid camera ...