Art in Motion
KINSHIP FESTIVAL ART INSTALLATION
Collaborations 2017- 2024
Murwillumbah, NSW, Australia.
The Kinship Festival is a local Indigenous yearly cultural festival and celebration for national Families Week. Its is led and directed by members of the Aboriginal and Torres Strait community and supporting services fostering meaningful participation and two-way learning. The Kinship Festival celebrates culture, participation and connection to land and people.
Since 2017 Karma has collaborated with Uncle Magpie Yerrubilgin an Aboriginal Elder and Song-man from the Minyunbal Yugambeh, the Kinship Festival and the community to create large-scale soil and sand installations based on local stories from Country. Sadly Uncle Magpie Yerrubilgin passed in 2023. The Kinship Festival continues to honour his life and contributions to the community and Country through the community installations.
The artworks tell stories from Country and are a collaborative vocal point of the festival with the yearly closing ceremony taking place around the art installation.
BUNYA NUT BUDJARRAHM // KINSHIP FESTIVAL ART INSTALLATION
Murwillumbah, NSW, Australia, 2018
The Bunyanut BUDJARRAHM art installation was designed by Uncle Magpie- Aboriginal Elder and Song-man from the Minyunbal Yugambeh tribe and created by the hands of many.
"Every four years was a time in the Aboriginal social calendar,where many tribes from Northern NSW and South East Queensland would come together in the Bunya Mountains. What would bring everyone together was the abundance of the Bunya Pine. This was a time when there was a lot of ceremony and plenty of corroborees, there was marriage and old friends caught up with one another, it was like the Kinship Festival.
The walking tracks to the Bunya mountains are still there today but in the form of highways and roads. The pathways are still there, we can still do that walk all over. Everyone from different nations would bring something from their country to contribute, much like we do with the Kinship Festival. The place where the Bunya nut gatherings were held was a big open grassland. In about 1890-1900 they stopped going there when the government policy of the day stopped the Bunya Festival, we are thinking today that we want to bring it back and bring some life into it.
What you see in the design is four Bunya Pines. The smaller symbols represent grass and palm trees as in palm forests and open country. There are four pathways that meet in the centre, these are songlines. On the outside are more pathways coming around from different directions into Bunya Country. So, everyone no matter where you come from are all going to end up here in the middle, this is where it all happens, this is where the lore is held, it's called Bunya Dreaming. Yoway."
-Uncle Magpie Yerrubilgin, Minyungbal Yugambeh Songman.
WATER DREAMING // KINSHIP FESTIVAL ART INSTALLATION
Murwillumbah, NSW, Australia, 2018
The Water Dreaming art installation was designed by Uncle Magpie- Aboriginal Elder and Song-man from the Minyunbal Yugambeh tribe and created by the hands of many. It shares the story of a central aquifer with underground rivers coming out from it, its billabongs, springs, and where the above ground rivers start their journey through the forest out to the big river then back into the sky and back again. It shares a message that Uncle Magpie says is important to everyone "that water is life and life is water". The Kinship Festival and Imagine the Land Project collaborated with the community to engage participation in the making of the large scale sand art installation. During the festival lead up soils, ochre and sands were collected from around the Northern Rivers caldera while hundreds of little clay bowls were made by kinder and primary school children. The artwork was completed with a closing ceremony at the end of the day.
Kinship Lore // KINSHIP FESTIVAL ART INSTALLATION
Murwillumbah, NSW, Australia, 2018
The Kinship Lore art installation was designed by Uncle Magpie- Aboriginal Elder and Song-man from the Minyunbal Yugambeh tribe and created by the hands of many. The Kinship Festival and Imagine the Land Project collaborated with the community to engage participation in the making of the large scale sand art installation. During the festival lead up soils, ochre and sands were collected from around the Northern Rivers caldera while hundreds of little clay bowls were made by kinder and primary school children. The artwork was completed with a closing ceremony at the end of the day.