Solidarity
with Sandon Point Aboriginal Tent Embassy (SPATE)
19–27 November 2004
Curators Rudi Vos and Jo Holder
Installation in Shopfront, Glebe Point Road, Sydney
Cross conversations/ texts and links
The Kuradji/Sandon Point Aboriginal
Tent Embassy (SPATE) is a rallying point in the debate about urban development
in sensitive coastal environments with significant Aboriginal heritage.
There has been a decade of protests and a picket and Aboriginal tent
embassy on the site on the Illawarra coast between the villages of Thirroul
and Bulli below Sydney.
This installation of works by Simon Blau, Sue Barnett, Sue Blanchfield,
Jelle van den Berg, Debra Dawes, Richard Hook, Tony Hull, Karen Hook,
Juan den Pourg, Jacky Redgate, Steve Smith, David Manks and Toni Warburton
expressed solidarity with SPATE co-ordinated by south coast artist Dootch
Kennedy. Funds raised were presented to Kuradji Sandon Point Foundation
to help pay for material costs and rebuilding after the embassy was “mysteriously” firebombed
and destroyed.
This land was once pubic land and land zoned for mining and industrial
use. It is a major headland and wetland corridor, containing 27% of the
remaining coastal wetlands of the Illawarra. Since the land was zoned
for development in 1995 and sold to the developer Stockland. It includes
a burial site dating back 6,000 years.
The embassy is accompanied by Bulli Community Pickett, set up by Northern
Illawarra Residents Action Group Inc (NIRAG) and local trade union members
in response to the misinformation and dubious dealings of Wollongong
Council, Sydney Water, DLWC and Stockland Trust Group in March 2001.
Members of the community staffed it 24 hours 7 days a week until late
2006. The picket is supported by the tent embassy.
Senior Yuin Lawman, Uncle 'Guboo' Ted Thomas, at 93 years of age, joined
the community blockade in early 2002. In the words of then Senator Aden
Ridgeway: " Guboo symbolizes all of the struggles for Indigenous
people about a need to sustain a connection back to the Dreaming. Most
of all he showed us the way to protect, nurture and feel something about
these things that inspire and give sustenance to the idea of the Dreaming,
and what it means to be able to protect them in the contemporary world."
The hope for the reconciliation embodied in these words inspired the
Illawarra community. For over 200 years Australian Governments, participated
in, or allowed acts of genocide against Aboriginal People. The collective
struggle of the Sandon Point Aboriginal Tent Embassy and local Indigenous
Elders affirms the dynamic nature of indigenous culture.
Just before Christmas 2006, state Planning Minister Frank Sartor announced
approval for the remaining Stockland and Anglican Church developments.
The 2003 Commission of Inquiry found the development was totally inappropriate
and the proposed development is even bigger than the initial plan of
2000. The embassy has not moved.
Links
information: www.sandon-point.org.au
