Form x Content – More than a guulany (tree): Indigenous knowledge systems Artists Dr Brian Martin and Associate Professor Brook Garru Andrew in conversation

For the inaugural Monash Art, Design and Architecture / MUMA Climate Action Event presented by the Wominjeka Djeembana Research Lab, artists Brook Garru Andrew and Brian Martin discuss the significance of trees within their individual practices and as part of their ARC Project: More than a guulany (tree): Indigenous knowledge systems.

When we look at the various Aboriginal languages around Australia today, there are not many words that translate as land, whereas we have many words that translate as Country. In Country, the non-human has the same importance as the human. Trees are really important to the relationality that we have with Country and in southeast Australia, much of the cultural heritage, the objects and artefacts that articulate this relationality have been removed and placed in museums both in Australia and overseas as part of colonisation. As artists we have both explored the significance of trees in our respective art practices and through an Australian Research Council project we are taking this research further. We will be connecting with those objects removed from Country and possibilities for their repatriation and talking and listening to Indigenous peoples across southeast Australia who hold knowledge about trees and cultural practice.

Brook Garru Andrew and Brian Martin are included in the exhibition Tree Story curated by Charlotte Day with Dr Brian Martin at MUMA until 10 April 2021.

Brian Martin

Dr Brian Martin is the faculty’s inaugural Associate Dean, Indigenous. He is a descendant of Muruwari, Bundjalung and Kamilaroi peoples.

Martin has been a practising artist for twenty-seven years and has exhibited both nationally and internationally specifically in the media of painting and drawing. His research and practice focuses on refiguring Australian art and culture from an Indigenous ideological perspective and based on a reciprocal relationship to “Country”. Previously Professor and Head of Research at the Institute of Koorie Education at Deakin University, he is also Honorary Professor of Eminence at Centurion University of Technology and Management in Odisha, India.

Brian Martin is represented by William Mora Galleries, Melbourne.

Brook Garru Andrew

Professor Brook Garru Andrew is an interdisciplinary artist who examines dominant narratives, often relating to colonialism and modernist histories.

Through museum and archival interventions, he aims to offer alternate versions of forgotten histories; illustrating different means for interpreting history in the world today. Apart from drawing inspiration from vernacular objects and the archive he travels internationally to work with communities and various private and public collections to tease out new interpretations. Most recently, Andrew has been awarded a Smithsonian Artist Research Fellowship and worked with the musée du quai Branly, Paris, as a Photography Residencies Laureate.

Brook Garru Andrew is represented by Tolarno Galleries, Melbourne; Roslyn Oxley9 Gallery, Sydney; and Galerie Nathalie Obadia, Paris and Brussels.

Form x Content is presented by Monash Art, Design & Architecture.
Programmed by Monash University Museum of Art.

^{Image: Dr Brian Martin (left) and Professor Brook Garru Andrew (right) Photo: Jessica Neath}