Indigenous Voices

Ms Smart, Mr Peters, Russell Bryant, Jeremy LeBois, Steve Harrison, Shilloh Peel, Johnny Lovett and Roslyn Peters

At Ooldea: photo by Jessie Boylan

 

The following webisodes feature several of the indigenous storytellers and creative artists who contributed to the Nuclear Futures Partnership Initiative across 2014-2016. Ms Smart, Mr Peters, Russell, Shilloh and Roslyn are members of the Yalata community where many of the artworks included in this special issue originated. Yalata is an Anangu community on the far west coast of South Australia, 1000 kilometres from Adelaide by road. Around 300 people live in the township -- primarily Pitjantjatjara Anangu who descended from the desert people in the north and north-west of SA. The families were displaced from the Maralinga Tjarutja lands and from Ooldea prior to the British atomic bomb tests that took place at Emu and Maralinga in the 1950s. Jeremy LeBois is Chair of the Maralinga Tjarutja Council and Maralinga is his ancestral land. Johnny Lovett is from the Gunditjmara community in Western Victoria, with Pitjantjatjara family connections. The Nuclear Futures community arts projects at Yalata coincided with controversial proposals by the South Australian government to extend nuclear industry in South Australia, including proposals for new nuclear waste repositories.

WEBISODES

1) Mr Peters, Anangu elder and musician at Yalata, reflects on the history of Maralinga and why he rejects proposals for nuclear waste dumps

2) Ms Smart OAM, community leader and visual artist at Yalata and Oak Valley, explains the impacts of nuclear testing including forced migration away from the Ooldea Mission

3) Jeremy LeBois, Chair of the Maralinga Tjarutja Council meets with atomic survivor groups at Nagasaki following the installation of the Australian sculpture in the Nagasaki Peace Park

4) Shilloh Peel, Yalata youth leader at the Nagasaki Peace Museum, as a member of the Anangu delegation for the unveiling of the sculpture 'Tree of Life: Gift of Peace' at Nagasaki

5) Russell Bryant, community leader and musician reflects on the gift of a sculpture from Yalata to the Nagasaki Peace Park.

6) Steve Harrison, Anangu sculptor and carver with his reflections on the Nagasaki sculpture project

7) Johnny Lovett, songwriter/musician and Mr Peters, Yalata elder and musician on the 'Sing Maralinga' music project

Production Credits

Camera/sound: Tania Safi, Jessie Boylan, Dani Marwick, Paul Brown

Editing: Ray Thomas

Producers: Paul Brown, Michele Madigan